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Benjamin Banneker
Benjamin Banneker (November 9, 1731 – October 19, 1806) was an American naturalist, mathematician, astronomer and almanac author. A landowner, he also worked as a surveyor and farmer.
Born in Baltimore County, Maryland, to a free African-American mother and a father who had formerly been enslaved, Banneker had little or no formal education and was largely self-taught. He became known for assisting Major Andrew Ellicott in a survey that established the original borders of the District of Columbia, the federal capital district of the United States.
Banneker's knowledge of astronomy helped him author a commercially successful series of almanacs. He corresponded with Thomas Jefferson on the topics of slavery and racial equality. Abolitionists and advocates of racial equality promoted and praised Banneker's works. Although a fire on the day of Banneker's funeral destroyed many of his papers and belongings, one of his journals and several of his remaining artifacts survived.
Banneker became a folk-hero after his death, leading to many accounts of his life being exaggerated or embellished. The names of parks, schools and streets commemorate him and his works, as do other tributes.
Banneker was born on November 9, 1731, in Baltimore County, Maryland, to Mary Banneky, a free black woman, and Robert, a freed slave from Guinea who died in 1759.
There are two conflicting accounts of Banneker's family history. Banneker himself and his earliest biographers described him as having only African ancestry. None of Banneker's surviving papers describe a white ancestor or identify the name of his grandmother. However, two lines of later research both suggest that Banneker's mother was the daughter of a white woman and an African slave, although they differ as to whether the Banneker surname came from his mother or father and the origin of the name, which could be from Banaka, a small village in the present-day Klay District of Bomi County in northwestern Liberia that had once participated in the African slave trade or "Banaka", the home of the Vai people, who have lived there since about 1500 when they left the Mali Empire.
In 1737, when he was 6, Banneker was named on the deed of his family's 100-acre (0.40 km2) farm in the Patapsco Valley in rural Baltimore County.
In 1791, a letter writer stated that Banneker's parents had sent him to an obscure school where he learned reading, writing and arithmetic as far as double position.[clarification needed] In contrast, unverified accounts, first appeared in books published more than 140 years after Banneker's death suggest that, as a young teenager, Banneker met and befriended Peter Heinrich, a Quaker who later established a school near the Banneker family farm. These accounts state that Heinrich shared his personal library and provided Banneker with his only classroom instruction. Banneker's formal education (if any) presumably ended when he was old enough to help on his family's farm.
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Benjamin Banneker
Benjamin Banneker (November 9, 1731 – October 19, 1806) was an American naturalist, mathematician, astronomer and almanac author. A landowner, he also worked as a surveyor and farmer.
Born in Baltimore County, Maryland, to a free African-American mother and a father who had formerly been enslaved, Banneker had little or no formal education and was largely self-taught. He became known for assisting Major Andrew Ellicott in a survey that established the original borders of the District of Columbia, the federal capital district of the United States.
Banneker's knowledge of astronomy helped him author a commercially successful series of almanacs. He corresponded with Thomas Jefferson on the topics of slavery and racial equality. Abolitionists and advocates of racial equality promoted and praised Banneker's works. Although a fire on the day of Banneker's funeral destroyed many of his papers and belongings, one of his journals and several of his remaining artifacts survived.
Banneker became a folk-hero after his death, leading to many accounts of his life being exaggerated or embellished. The names of parks, schools and streets commemorate him and his works, as do other tributes.
Banneker was born on November 9, 1731, in Baltimore County, Maryland, to Mary Banneky, a free black woman, and Robert, a freed slave from Guinea who died in 1759.
There are two conflicting accounts of Banneker's family history. Banneker himself and his earliest biographers described him as having only African ancestry. None of Banneker's surviving papers describe a white ancestor or identify the name of his grandmother. However, two lines of later research both suggest that Banneker's mother was the daughter of a white woman and an African slave, although they differ as to whether the Banneker surname came from his mother or father and the origin of the name, which could be from Banaka, a small village in the present-day Klay District of Bomi County in northwestern Liberia that had once participated in the African slave trade or "Banaka", the home of the Vai people, who have lived there since about 1500 when they left the Mali Empire.
In 1737, when he was 6, Banneker was named on the deed of his family's 100-acre (0.40 km2) farm in the Patapsco Valley in rural Baltimore County.
In 1791, a letter writer stated that Banneker's parents had sent him to an obscure school where he learned reading, writing and arithmetic as far as double position.[clarification needed] In contrast, unverified accounts, first appeared in books published more than 140 years after Banneker's death suggest that, as a young teenager, Banneker met and befriended Peter Heinrich, a Quaker who later established a school near the Banneker family farm. These accounts state that Heinrich shared his personal library and provided Banneker with his only classroom instruction. Banneker's formal education (if any) presumably ended when he was old enough to help on his family's farm.