Benjamin Banneker
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| Benjamin Banneker | |
|---|---|
| Born | November 9, 1731 Baltimore County, Province of Maryland, British America |
| Died | October 9, 1806 (aged 74) Baltimore County, Maryland, U.S. |
| Nationality | American |
| Other names | Benjamin Bannaker |
| Occupation | Scientist, surveyor, almanac author, farmer |
Benjamin Banneker (November 9, 1731 – October 9, 1806) was a free African American scientist, surveyor, almanac author and farmer. Born in Baltimore County, Maryland, to a free African American woman and a former slave, Banneker had little formal education and was largely self-taught. He is known for being part of a group led by Major Andrew Ellicott that surveyed the borders of the original 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, drafter of the United States Declaration of Independence, on the topics ofslavery and racial equality. Abolitionists and advocates of racial equality promoted and praised his 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 are presently available for public viewing.
Parks, schools, streets and other tributes have commemorated Banneker throughout the years since he lived. However, many accounts of his life exaggerate or falsely attribute his works.
Contents
[hide]Early life
Benjamin Banneker was born on November 9, 1731, in Baltimore County, Maryland to his mother Mary, a free black, and his father Robert, a freed slave from Guinea.[1] There are two conflicting accounts of Banneker's family history. Banneker himself and his earliest biographers described him as having only African ancestry.[2][3][4] None of Banneker's surviving papers describe a white ancestor or identify the name of his grandmother.[3] However, later biographers have contended that Banneker's mother was the child of Molly Welsh, a white indentured servant, and an African slave named Banneka.[3] The first published description of Molly Welsh was based on interviews with her descendants that took place after 1836, long after the deaths of both Molly and Benjamin.[3][5]
Molly may have purchased Banneka to help establish a farm located near what eventually became Ellicott's Mills, Maryland, west of Baltimore.[6] One biographer has suggested that Banneka may have been a member of the Dogon tribe that were reported to have knowledge of astronomy.[7] Molly supposedly freed and married Banneka, who may have shared his knowledge of astronomy with her.[8] Although born after Banneka's death, Benjamin may have acquired some knowledge of astronomy from Molly.[7]
In 1737, Banneker was named at the age of 6 on the deed of his family's 100-acre (0.40 km2) farm in the Patapsco River valley in rural Baltimore County.[9][10] He lived on the farm for nearly all of his life.
As a young teenager, Banneker met and befriended Peter Heinrichs, a Quaker who established a school near the Banneker farm.[11] Quakers were leaders in the anti-slavery movement and advocates of racial equality (see Quakers in the Abolition Movement andTestimony of equality).[12] Heinrichs shared his personal library and provided Banneker with his only classroom instruction.[11] Banneker's formal education ended when he was old enough to help on his family's farm.[13]
Notable works
In 1753 at the age of 22, Banneker completed a wooden clock that struck on the hour. He appears to have modeled his clock from a borrowed pocket watch by carving each piece to scale. The clock continued to work until Banneker's death.[13][14][15]
After his father died in 1759, Banneker lived with his mother and sisters. In 1771, the Ellicott family moved to the area and bought land along the Patapsco Falls near Banneker's farm on which to develop a gristmill.[9][16] Banneker supplied their workers with food and studied the mills.[16] The Ellicotts were Quakers and shared the same views on racial equality as did many of their faith. George Ellicott loaned Banneker books and equipment to begin a more formal study of astronomy in 1788.[17] The following year, Banneker sent George his work calculating a solar eclipse.[18]
In February 1791, Major Andrew Ellicott, a member of the same family, hired Banneker to assist in the initial survey of the boundaries of the new federal district, which the 1790 federal Residence Act and later legislation authorized. Formed from land along thePotomac River that the states of Maryland and Virginia ceded to the federal government of the United States in accordance with the Residence Act, the territory that became the original District of Columbia was a square measuring 10 miles (16 km) on each side, totaling 100 square miles (260 km2).[19][20] Ellicott's team placed boundary stones at every mile point along the borders of the new capital territory.[19]
Banneker's duties on the survey consisted primarily of making astronomical observations at Jones Point in Alexandria, Virginia, to ascertain the location of the starting point for the survey.[21] He also maintained a clock that he used to relate points on the ground to the positions of stars at specific times.[21] However, at age 59, Banneker left the boundary survey in April 1791 due to illness and difficulties completing the survey.[22] He returned to his home at Ellicott's Mills to work on an ephemeris. Andrew Ellicott continued the survey with his brothers Benjamin and Joseph Ellicott and other assistants through 1791 and 1792.[19][23]
At Ellicott's Mills, Banneker made astronomical calculations that predicted solar and lunar eclipses for inclusion in his ephemeris. He placed the ephemeris and its subsequent revisions in a number of editions in a six-year series of almanacs which were printed and sold in six cities in four states for the years 1792 through 1797: Baltimore; Philadelphia; Wilmington, Delaware; Alexandria, Virginia; Petersburg, Virginia; and Richmond, Virginia.[24][25][26] He also kept a series of journals that contained his notebooks for astronomical observations, his diary and accounts of his dreams.[27] The journals, only one of which survived a fire on the day of his funeral, additionally contained a number of mathematical calculations and puzzles.[27][28] The surviving journal documents the 1749, 1766 and 1783 emergences of Brood X of the seventeen-year periodical cicada, Magicicada septendecim, and predicts an emergence in 1800.[29]
The title page of an edition of Banneker's 1792 Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland and Virginia Almanack and Ephemeris stated that the publication contained:
In addition to the information that its title page described, the almanac contained a tide table for the Chesapeake Bay region. That edition and others listed times for high water or high tide at Cape Charles and Point Lookout, Virginia and Annapolis and Baltimore, Maryland.[1]
In his 1793 almanac, Banneker included letters sent between Thomas Jefferson and himself.[25] The title page of a Baltimore edition of his 1795 almanac had a woodcut portrait of him as he may have appeared, but which a writer later concluded was more likely a portrayal of an idealized African American youth.[31][32]
The almanacs' editors prefaced the publications with adulatory references to Banneker and his race.[33] The 1792 and 1793 almanacs contained lengthy commendations that James McHenry,[34] a signer of the United States Constitution and self-described friend of Banneker, had written in 1791.[35] A 1796 edition stated:
Supported by Andrew, George and Elias Ellicott and heavily promoted by the Society for the Promotion of the Abolition of Slavery of Maryland and of Pennsylvania, the early editions of the almanacs achieved commercial success.[37] After these editions were published, William Wilberforce and other prominent abolitionists praised Banneker and his works in the House of Commons of Great Britain.[37]
Political views
Banneker expressed his views on slavery and racial equality in a letter to Thomas Jefferson and in other documents that he placed within his 1793 almanac. The almanac contained copies of his correspondence with Jefferson, poetry by the African American poet Phillis Wheatley and by the English anti-slavery poet William Cowper, and anti-slavery speeches and essays from England and America.[25]
Banneker's 1793 almanac also contained a copy of "A Plan of Peace-office for the United States" that Benjamin Rush had authored.[38] The Plan proposed the appointment of a "Secretary of Peace", described the Secretary's powers and advocated federal support and promotion of the Christian religion. The Plan stated:
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- 1. Let a Secretary of Peace be appointed to preside in this office; ...; let him be a genuine republican and a sincere Christian ....
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- 2. Let a power be given to the Secretary to establish and maintain free schools in every city, village and township in the United States; ... Let the youth of our country be instructed in reading, writing, and arithmetic, and in the doctrines of a religion of some kind; the Christian religion should be preferred to all others; for it belongs to this religion exclusively to teach us not only to cultivate peace with all men, but to forgive—nay more, to love our very enemies....
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- 3. Let every family be furnished at public expense, by the Secretary of this office, with an American edition of the Bible....
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- 4. Let the following sentence be inscribed in letters of gold over the door of every home in the United States: The Son of Man Came into the World, Not To Destroy Men's Lives, But To Save Them.
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- 5. ...[39]
Correspondence with Thomas Jefferson
On August 19, 1791, after departing the federal capital area, Banneker wrote a letter to Thomas Jefferson, who in 1776 had drafted the United States Declaration of Independence and in 1791 was serving as the United States Secretary of State.[40][41] Quoting language in the Declaration, the letter expressed a plea for justice for African Americans. To further support this plea, Banneker included within the letter a handwritten manuscript of an almanac for 1792 containing his ephemeris with his astronomical calculations.
In the letter, Banneker accused Jefferson of criminally using fraud and violence to oppress his slaves by stating:
The letter ended:
An English abolitionist, Thomas Day, had earlier written in a 1776 letter:
Thomas Jefferson's own actions and statements on slavery and on the treatment of slaves were ambiguous and paradoxical (see: Thomas Jefferson and slavery).[45] He reportedly instructed overseers at his home at Monticello to not whip his slaves, but the overseers often ignored his wishes during his frequent absences.[46] A researcher has found no reliable document that portrays Jefferson in the act of applying physical correction.[47]
Without directly responding to Banneker's accusation, Jefferson replied to Banneker's letter in a series of nuanced statements that expressed his interest in the advancement of the equality of America's black population.[48] Jefferson's reply stated:
Marie-Jean-Antoine-Nicolas de Caritat, marquis de Condorcet, to whom Jefferson sent Banneker's almanac, was a noted French mathematician and abolitionist.[51] It appears that the Academy of Sciences itself did not receive the almanac.[52]
When writing his letter, Banneker informed Jefferson that his 1791 work with Andrew Ellicott on the District boundary survey had affected his work on his 1792 ephemeris and almanac by stating:
On the same day that he replied to Banneker (August 30, 1791), Jefferson sent a letter to the Marquis de Condorcet that contained the following paragraph relating to Banneker's race, abilities, almanac and work with Andrew Ellicott:
In 1809, three years after Banneker's death, Jefferson expressed a different opinion of Banneker in a letter to Joel Barlow that criticized a "diatribe" that a French abolitionist, Henri Grégoire, had written in 1808:[55]
Death
Banneker never married.[9] Because of declining sales, his last almanac was published in 1797. After selling much of his farm to the Ellicotts and others, he died in his log cabin nine years later on October 9, 1806, exactly one month before his 75th birthday. His chronic alcoholism, which worsened as he aged, may have contributed to his death.[57]
An obituary concluded:
A commemorative obelisk that the Maryland Bicentennial Commission and the State Commission on Afro American History and Culture erected in 1977 near his unmarked grave stands in the yard of the Mt. Gilboa African Methodist Episcopal Church in Oella, Maryland (see Mount Gilboa Chapel).[59]
Banneker artifacts
On the day of his funeral in 1806, a fire burned Banneker's log cabin to the ground, destroying many of his belongings and papers.[1][60][61] A member of the Elllicott family, which had retained Banneker's only remaining journal, donated the document and other Banneker manuscripts to the Maryland Historical Society in 1987.[62] The family also retained several items that Banneker had used after borrowing them from George Ellicott.[60][63]
In 1996, a descendent of George Ellicott decided to sell at auction some of the items, including a table, candlesticks and molds.[60][64] Although supporters of the planned Benjamin Banneker Historical Park and Museum in Oella, Maryland, had hoped to obtain these and several other items related to Banneker and the Ellicotts, a Virginia investment banker won most of the items with a series of bids that totaled $55,250. The purchaser stated that he expected to keep some of the items and to donate the rest to the plannedAfrican American Civil War Memorial museum in Washington, D.C.[65]
In 1997, it was announced that the artifacts would be loaned to the Benjamin Banneker Historical Park and Museum in Oella and to the Banneker-Douglass Museum in Annapolis, Maryland.[66] A visitor to the Oella facility reported in 2014 that candle molds and a desk that Banneker had used were on display in the museum.[67]
Mythology and legacy
Main article: Mythology and legacy of Benjamin Banneker
A substantial mythology exaggerating Benjamin Banneker's accomplishments has developed during the two centuries that have elapsed since he lived.[68][69] Several such urban legends describe Banneker's alleged activities in the Washington, D.C. area around the time that he assisted Andrew Ellicott in the federal district boundary survey.[22][69][70] Others involve his clock, his almanacs and his journals.[69]
A United States postage stamp and the names of a number of recreational and cultural facilities, schools, streets and other facilities and institutions throughout the United States have commemorated Banneker's documented and mythical accomplishments throughout the years since he lived.
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