Rumblings from the keyboard of Pete Eveleigh,
a web designer and developer based in Gloucester, UK

Sir Charles Wheatstone

Posted: July 19th, 2004 | Author: | Filed under: Vintage | | Comments Off

I’ve just discovered that Sir Charles Wheatstone (1802-1875) was born in a house not 100 yards from my own.

Who?

Sir Charles made a number of important contributions to science. Anyone familar with physics will know of the Rheostat and Wheatstone Bridge. He also developed a system to speed up morse telegraph transmissions by using punched paper tape – a system later used by the pioneers of computing. Anyway, I digress…

Now, since Sir Charles is an important figure in scientific history, you’d think the powers that be would have put some kind of plaque on the wall of his birthplace. Nope. Nothing. Not a sausage. Other towns and cities do it and Gloucester could do with things like that. I only found out by accident when I was looking for information on nuclear bunkers.

Stuff like this annoys me. I’ve a good mind to write to Adam Hart-Davis about it.

No Comments on “Sir Charles Wheatstone”

  1. 1 Sarah said at 9:41 pm on July 23rd, 2004:

    You can have our spare room for a while – but you’ll have to pay rent!