David Rittenhouse

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David Rittenhouse

Born April 8, 1732(1732-04-08)
Paper Mill Run, Pennsylvania
Died June 26, 1796 (aged 64)
Occupation Astronomer
Inventor
Mathematician

David Rittenhouse (April 8, 1732 – June 26, 1796) was a renowned American astronomer, inventor, mathematician, surveyor, scientific instrument craftsman, and public official. Rittenhouse was a member of the American Philosophical Society and the first director of the United States Mint.

Contents

[edit] Biography

Rittenhouse was born near Germantown, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in a small village called RittenhouseTown, located along a stream called Paper Mill Run, the stream itself a tiny tributary of the Wissahickon Creek. He was self-taught and from a young age showed great ability in science and mathematics. At nineteen years old, he started a scientific instrument shop at his father's farm in West Norriton Township, Pennsylvania. His skill with instruments, particularly clocks, led him to construct two orreries, one of which is currently in the library of the University of Pennsylvania and the other is at Peyton Hall of Princeton University. Rittenhouse was one of the first to build a telescope used in the United States.

His telescope, which utilized natural spider silk to form the reticle, was used to observe and record part of the transit of Venus across the sun on 1769-06-03, as well as the planet's atmosphere.

In 1784, David Rittenhouse and surveyor Andrew Ellicott and their crew completed the unfinished survey of the Mason Dixon line to the southwest corner of Pennsylvania, five degrees of longitude from the Delaware River.

In 1785, Rittenhouse made perhaps the first diffraction grating using 50 hairs between two finely threaded screws, with an approximate spacing of about 100 lines per inch. This was roughly the same technique that Joseph von Fraunhofer used in 1821 for his wire diffraction grating.

In 1813, Rittenhouse's nephew (and American Philosophical Society member) William Barton published a biography, Memoirs of the life of David Rittenhouse. Former President of the United States Thomas Jefferson ordered six copies directly from the author.


[edit] Young Life

At a young age Rittenhouse showed a high level of intelligence by creating a working scale model of his grandfather's paper mill. His uncle was a carpenter in Philadelphia, who died at a young age. When he passed away, he left young Rittenhouse a set of tools and instructional books. It was with these tools that Rittenhouse became an inventor. These are the tools that created his whole career. Without these tools, David Rittenhouse would be a name lost to history. David Rittenhouse has greatly impacted the United States of America in many different ways. His influences are many, from creating the first observatory in the United States, to founding the Mint of the United States of America, to the time he created his first clock as a young boy.

[edit] Clubs and Societies

After Galileo saw the first sign of Earth's neighbor, Venus, in 1610, astronomers who had been studying the planet, chose Rittenhouse as the person to study the transit path of Venus and it's atmosphere. Rittenhouse was the perfect person to study the mysterious planet, as he had a personal observatory on his family farm . "His telescope, which he made himself, utilized grating intervals and spider threads on the focus of the telescope." His telescope is very similar to the modern day telescope, which we still use to this day. Rittenhouse served on the American Astronomic Society, and this was another factor in being chosen to study Venus . Throughout his life, he had the honour to serve in many different clubs, committees, and much more. One example is the American Philological Society, he began as a librarian, became secretary, and after Benjamin Franklin's death, he became Vice President. Another one of his interests was the Royal Society of London; this was very rare to see a foreign member of this very pristine society. All of the societies that he served in did partially affect his marriage. His first wife and him were friends since childhood, and got along very well. They had two children, but she died due to complication during the birth of their second child. He remarried soon after, but his personal life and his love for his work greatly impacted the love in this marriage.

[edit] First Director of the United States Mint

David Rittenhouse was treasurer of Pennsylvania from 1777-1789 and with these skills and the help of George Washington, he became the first director of the United States Mint. "George Washington chose him not so much on his previous experience as Treasurer of Pennsylvania, but because of a pair of custom glasses that Rittenhouse made Washington. On April 2, 1792 the United States Mint open its doors, but would not make coins for almost four more months. Rittenhouse believed that the design of the coin made the coin a piece of artwork. "The first coins where made from flatware that was provided by Washington himself on the morning of July 30, 1792." The coins where hand struck by Rittenhouse, to test the new equipment. The coins where given to Washington as a token of appreciation to everything that he did to make a national mint a reality. The coins where still pattern pieces, and had not approved by Congress. Large coin production did not began until 1796. Rittenhouse resigned from the Mint on June 30, 1795, due to poor health. In 1871, the congress approved a commemorative coin in honor of David Rittenhouse.

[edit] Notable contributions to the United States

David Rittenhouse made many breakthroughs during his life, which were great contributions to the United States. During the first part of his career, he was a surveyor for Great Britain, but later served for the Pennsylvanian government. Rittenhouse worked with some very famous people during his career, such as William Penn and Lord Baltimore. As a surveyor for Great Britain, his partners where Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon, who were the creators of the boundaries for Pennsylvania and Maryland. When his life as a surveyor ended, he begin the dawn of his scientific career. When he was thirteen years of age, he had fully mastered Isaac Newton Laws of Motion and Gravity. As a young boy he loved to build scale models of everything. Some of the things he built were a working waterwheel and a paper mill. Rittenhouse never went to school and was completely self-educated from family books. With his love of tools and his amazing ability to create things he crafted two orrieals for the University of New Jersey. In return for the gift, the college gave him a scholarship to attend the college enabling him to get a degree in philosophy. At the age of twenty-eight, he published his first mathematical paper. This was only one of many papers he published throughout his life. His career was on hold for a couple of years, but he continued inventing throughout that time. He invented the modern day flaming arrow; this invention was just what he needs to get his career back on track. The government liked his flaming arrow so much that he was hired to supervise the casting of cannons.

[edit] Notable events

Grave of David Rittenhouse at Laurel Hill Cemetery in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Grave of David Rittenhouse at Laurel Hill Cemetery in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Other notable events in Rittenhouse's life include:

[edit] Rittenhouse Square

In 1825, one of William Penn's original squares in Philadelphia, called 'Southwest Square' (being in the southwest quadrant of the original city plan) was renamed Rittenhouse Square in David Rittenhouse's honor. Further to the west on Walnut Street, University of Pennsylvania houses its Physics and Mathematics departments in the David Rittenhouse Laboratory.

[edit] Transit of Venus

His great excitement at observing the infrequently-occurring transit of Venus (for which he had prepared for a year) resulted in his fainting during the observation. In addition to the work involved in the preparations, Rittenhouse had also been ill the week before the transit. Lying on his back beneath the telescope, trained at the afternoon sun, he regained consciousness after a few minutes and continued his observations. His account of the transit, published in the Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, does not mention his fainting, though it is otherwise meticulous in its record.

[edit] References

  • Greenslade, Thomas B., "Wire Diffraction Gratings," The Physics Teacher, February 2004. Volume 42 Issue 2, pp. 76-77. [1]

[edit] External links

Preceded by
New title		 1st Director of the United States Mint
1792-1795		 Succeeded by
Henry William de Saussure


Persondata
NAME Rittenhouse, David
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION =Astronomer, Inventor, Mathematician
DATE OF BIRTH April 8, 1732
PLACE OF BIRTH Paper Mill Run, Pennsylvania
DATE OF DEATH June 26, 1796
PLACE OF DEATH
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Rittenhouse"
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