A tobacco farmer, and amateur astronomer, Benjamin Banneker was an inspiration for his mathematical achievements. He is frequently described as the first African American man of math. Banneker was born free in Baltimore County, Maryland, on 9 November 1731. He was the son of a freed slave from Guinea named Robert and of Mary Banneky, daughter of a formerly English servant named Molly Welsh and her husband, Bannka, a slave whom she freed. Banneker’s early years were spent with his family, including three sisters, growing tobacco on his parents’ 100-acre farm near the banks of the Patapsco River. In his early years he had been trained to read and write by his grandmother by means of a Bible she had purchased from England, but his only formal schooling was attendance for a week or two in a nearby Quaker one-room schoolhouse. Benjamin became an excellent reader, borrowing books from wherever he could, and developed considerable skill …show more content…
His significant accomplishments include the successful prediction of a solar eclipse. Banneker spent most of his life on his family's 100-acre farm outside Baltimore. There, he taught himself astronomy by watching the stars and learned advanced mathematics from borrowed textbooks. In 1752, Banneker attracted attention by building a clock entirely out of wood. The first ever built in America, it kept precise time for decades. Twenty years later, Banneker again caused a stir, when he successfully forecast a 1789 solar eclipse. His correct prediction contradicted those of better-known mathematicians and astronomers. He was inspired by an industrialist in Maryland, Joseph Ellicott and started astronomical calculations in 1773. In 1789 he had made a prediction about a solar eclipse which really did occur. His calculations gave the positions of the planets and stars for each day of the year, and his almanacs were published annually from 1792 until