Why do we remember benjamin banneker

Throughout a life of reading and self-teaching, he became an expert in farming, mathematics, land surveying, mechanical engineering, and astronomy. So how and why did this brilliant scientist, naturalist, and writer of almanacs wind up dying in a little log cabin near the family house on land that was left to him but of which he was no longer the owner? In his final days, with emancipation, Juneteenth, 60 years away, how did Banneker feel about his life—free, but not?

Benjamin Banneker was born in the antebellum south. He loved the environment and greenery of the farmland around him. The injustice and discrimination of the times did not abate his curiosity. His fascination with life led to his intellectually observing the magic and mysteries of nature and science at a very young age—perhaps younger than one might think.

In May-June, , there was an emergence of what we now call Brood X, the largest population of year cicadas. Baby Benjamin was only five months old. There are numerous milestones for babies during this time. The infant can sit with support, hold up his head and chest, and roll over from front to back. Baby Benjamin was looking and listening. Did he naturally note the magic rhythms of Magicicada septemdecim? Can we say that he did not? Where exactly? Inferences from the sounds in his name point some researchers to the Wolof of Senegal.

Other writers and researchers, myself included, believe Bannaka to have been of the Dogon people of Mali, who practiced and preserved their own ancient traditions and learning. Bannaka had been captured under enemy fire, sold to whites, and enslaved. This son of a chieftain continued to carry with him not only his dignity though, but his sophisticated agricultural knowledge, and likely an astute attention to the stars such as Sirius, the Dog Star of summer , as well as the ingenious mathematical skill that gave the Dogon a unique reputation among neighboring communities in Africa.

What of that knowledge and spirit might have been passed down to his infant grandson through nature or nurture? The Dogon star smiled down, Dually anointing his head and vision alike Baby Ben saw the magic, wings twirling around Into the May night The year cicada singing loudly With delight. She was named Molly Welsh, and she had experienced her own problems.

Coming from a destitute family in Devon, England, she had to work as a milkmaid to help make ends meet. In this job, there was no room for mistakes. Unfortunately, she became the indirect culprit of a mistake in , when the cow she was milking kicked the milk bucket over.

Of course, Molly was blamed. Fortunately for her, she could read, and so was bound instead for seven years of forced labor as an indentured servant on a tobacco farm in America. Molly was lucky.

The English had a plan. They wanted land and they planned to colonize America fast. After paying her dues, she was not only given 50 acres of land and supplies to build a farm business, but also the authority to purchase humans and enslave them.

She eventually married one. As recorded in stories passed down among friends of the family, Bannaka had refused to work as an enslaved person, was averse to getting his hands dirty; he was elegant and determined; he was royalty. From their marriage, four daughters were born. By the time Benjamin Banneker was born, his grandfather had already passed away, sometime in the s, tragically never seeing his African chieftain father again. What does trauma like this do to our gene expression, and to what extent can it carry on, epigenetically, from generation to generation?

Did she pass it on to her son? As he grew older and intellectually wiser, she knew she could teach him to read, and she did, using the Bible. He also was given a few years of education at a Quaker school. These experiences, along with his own innate and genius intellect, would take Benjamin Banneker on a long journey and many adventures in life, though he would barely leave the area in which he was born.

They demonstrated to their children how to work with the living things all around to sustain them for life, through cultivation, harvest, and use or sale at market.

Banneker enjoyed studying, playing with, and observing all types of insects and bugs, particularly the bees and locusts. Banneker witnessed their marvelous onslaught in earnest for the first time at age His curiosity piqued, he began to observe and study the cicada scientifically.

In , Benjamin borrowed a watch from a friend. He dismantled it and used it as the model for a scaled-up version of his own design in wood. For almost 50 years, people visited from long distances to see the remarkable device, as well as this remarkable man.

In , his father, Robert, died. Benjamin was left to run the farm and take care of his mother, his sisters, and himself, having never married. It was at this time that he constructed the cabin he would live in for the rest of his life, right next to the one in which he had spent his youth. In his spare time, he continued to study. He read a lot. Self-taught, he played the flute and violin to ease his weary mind of everyday worries and injustices.

Outside of his almanacs, Banneker also published information on bees and calculated the cycle of the year locust.

Banneker's accomplishments extended into other realms as well, including civil rights. In , Jefferson was secretary of state and Banneker considered the respected Virginian, though a slaveholder, to also be open to view African Americans as more than slaves.

Jefferson quickly acknowledged Banneker's letter, writing a response. Banneker's outspokenness with regard to the issue of slavery earned him the widespread support of the abolitionist societies in Maryland and Pennsylvania, both of which helped him publish his almanac.

I thank you sincerely for your letter of the 19th. I have taken the liberty of sending your almanac to Monsieur de Condorcet, Secretary of the Academy of sciences at Paris, and member of the Philanthropic society because I considered it as a document to which your whole colour had a right for their justification against the doubts which have been entertained of them.

I am with great esteem, Sir, Your most obedt. Never married, Banneker continued to conduct his scientific studies throughout his life.

By , sales of his almanac had declined and he discontinued publication. In the following years, he sold off much of his farm to the Ellicotts and others to make ends meet, continuing to live in his log cabin. On October 9, , after his usual morning walk, Banneker died in his sleep, just a month short of his 75th birthday. On Tuesday, October 11, at the family burial ground a few yards from this house, Benjamin Banneker was laid to rest. During the services, mourners were startled to see his house had caught on fire, quickly burning down.

Nearly everything was destroyed, including his personal effects, furniture and wooden clock. The cause of the fire was never determined. With limited materials having been preserved related to Banneker's life and career, there's been a fair amount of legend and misinformation presented. Here are three you may not have heard about. The clock continued to run until it was destroyed in a fire forty years later. People traveled to see the clock, which was made entirely out of hand-carved wooden parts.

Banneker, whose schooling and scientific training was minimal, had a clear talent for mathematics and machines, writes the Library of Congress. He was also a talented astronomer—a skill that proved useful in producing the Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia Almanac and Ephemeris , which he published from to As a gentleman farmer, Banneker had many opportunities to examine the natural world around him.