• Question: Who discovered electricity?

    Asked by kayelectric to Amy, Karen, Sarah, Will on 20 Jun 2012.
    • Photo: Karen Reed

      Karen Reed answered on 20 Jun 2012:

      Great question and I don’t know – so I’ve just had a quick look and there seems there are a few candidates… Benjamin Franklin is said to be the father of electricity when he flew a kite into a thunderstorm in 1752, but before that in 600BC Thales of Miletos are said to have talked about static electric.
      In 800, the physicist Alessandro Volta made the voltaic pile – the 1st kind of battery so that was a big jump into modern day use of electricity.
      Hope that helps

    • Photo: Sarah Martin

      Sarah Martin answered on 20 Jun 2012:

      Hi kayelectric,

      Good answer from Karen – I’ll add that electricity comes from the word ήλεκτρον or electron, the Greek word for “amber”, which is fossilised trea resin that attracts small objects after being rubbed. The first time electricity was used as a word in English was in a book by Thomas Browne called Pseudodoxia Epidemica in 1646.
      And later, in 1791, Luigi Galvani published his discovery of bioelectricity, demonstrating that electricity was used by nerve cells to pass signals to the muscles.
      And in 1800 the first battery was built by Alessandro Volta using alternating layers of zinc and copper, providing scientists with a reliable source of electrical energy – better than waiting for lightning anyway!

      🙂
      Sarah

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