Sir+Isaac+Newton



=Early Life= - Isaac Newton was born on December 25, 1642. - Isaac Newton was born prematurely, and the midwife who delivered him was certain he would not live. - Isaac's parents were named Hannah and Isaac Newton. - Isaac Newton Sr. was a farmer, as was his grandfather. They did not know how to read or write. - Hannah Newton could read and write. She was close with her two brothers who were clergymen. - Hannah Newton remarried Barnabas Smith, a clergyman, in 1646. After she remarried, she left Isaac alone to be taken care of by his grandmother. He was only three at the time. - Isaac Newton spent much of his childhood alone. When he was ten, his stepfather died and his mother moved back home with her three other children. - While Isaac Newton was in grammar school, he stayed with the Clark family. Mr. Clark owned an apothecary, which helped Isaac to understand chemistry. - Isaac Newton did not do well in grammar school. It is believed that this was because the material was far too underwhelming for him. - ***I did find in a book that Newton carved his name into a desk at his grammar school. This would be great to have for our exhibit. I'll try to find out more about where it currently resides and what their policy is on lending it out.** - Isaac Newton was extremely interested in windmills and sundials. He carved them and sketched them in several different places in his hometown.
 * - *I also found a plaster cast of a sundial that Isaac Newton carved on a wall when he was 9. It's currently being held in Colsterworth Church. If anybody wants to research this and see what their policies are, they would be really unique pieces to have.**
 * - *There is an Isaac Newton Shopping Centre in Grantham, where he grew up.**

=Later Life= - Isaac Newton entered Cambridge in 1661. - Isaac Newton came to be known as one of the principal founders of eighteenth-century Enlightenment thought (Dobbs and Jacob, 7). - Newton invented Calculus. - Newton designed the first reflecting telescope. - Newton figured out the principle of gravity. - Newton proved that white light contains all the colors of the rainbow. - **"If I have seen further than most men, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." - Isaac Newton.** With that being said, I really do think we should pay some homage to Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo, and Descartes in the exhibit. Newton clearly credited their work to his success, so I think it's important that we recognize that. I'll make a page for these scientists so we can include some of their ideas and see what we want to include in the exhibit. - Isaac Newton was a //sizar// in Trinity College. A sizar paid lower fees, and they acted as servants to the wealthier students and teachers (Anderson, 33). - At the Sturbridge Fair, Isaac Newton bought his first book on astrology. To help him understand the mathematics involved, he also bought a Geometry textbook by Euclid. - While Isaac Newton was still a student, he developed the binomial theorum. A binomial is two numbers connected by a plus or minus sign. This rule provided a shortcut for multiplying a binomial by itself many times over (Anderson, 36-7). - Isaac Newton had a book in which he recorded things he wanted to learn more about. He had about 45 different headings such as: matter, time, soul, sleep, water and salt, etc. It was in this book that he wrote his theory of the tides being connected with the phases of the moon. He mastered this theory without ever having seen the ocean. - In the Spring of 1665, Isaac Newton earned his bachelor of arts degree. - Near the end of 1664, the Black Death rampaged through Europe. By the summer of 1665, it had killed 31,000 people. Many people were fleeing from London, and because Cambridge closed in August 1665, Isaac returned home. - The eighteen months he was back at home are known as Newton's "miracle years." - Isaac Newton created the branch of mathematics known a fluxions, from the word flux, which means constant changing or flowing. Now it's called Calculus. - In Fall of 1665, Newton used fluxions to find the area under an open curve known as a hyperbola. - Newton used Kepler's laws of motion to come up with some solutions as to the moon's orbit and gravity. - Using Calculus, Isaac Newton was able to prove Kepler's theory. - Newton also experimented in depth with prisms and light. - Example of Newton's prism experiments in Anderson's book on page 55. - Cambridge University reopened in march of 1666. During this time, Isaac Newton was studying for his Master or Arts and preparing to take his fellowship exam. - Becoming a fellow was very political. Had Newton not been one of the nine appointed fellows, he most likely would have returned home to his mother's farm. - Two years after Newton became a fellow, Isaac Newton was appointed as professor of mathematics. He was only 27. - Isaac Newton's desire to make a telescope that would not have fringes of color around the objects that were looked at inspired his reflecting telescope. He used reflecting mirrors instead of lenses (see James Gregory vs. Isaac Newton Reflecting Telescope, Anderson page 58). - Newton's first reflecting telescope was only about eight inches long, however the images it projected were clearer and larger than bigger telescopes. Newton showed his telescope to Professor Barrow, who took it to London in 1671 in order to show it to King Charles II and the Royal Society. - In 1672, Isaac Newton was invited to become a member of the Royal Society. - Shortly after his admission to the Royal Society, Newton became fascinated with chemistry, and then alchemy. - Isaac Newton studied alchemy in order to better grasp the understanding of life itself. - In 1684, Robert Hooke discussed the movement of the planets with Christopher Wren and Edmund Halley in a coffee house in London. It was this discussion that inspired the men to search for a mathematical equation that would prove planets travel in an ellipse. Newton had already proved this, and he sent his work to Edmund Halley in a nine-page paper. - The first volume was finished before Easter of 1685, the second volume completed by late summer. - Volume 3 of the Principa covered: moons, planets, comets, and tides. - Halley used Newton's principles to discover Halley's comet, which appeared in 1758 after Halley had died. However, the comet was still named after him. - In the fall of 1693, Newton began to develop health problems. He suffered a complete mental breakdown, sending letters to his friends and accusing them of plotting against him. This time was known as Newton's Black Year. - There are several different theories as to what Newton was suffering from: Mercury poisoning, overwork, depression, etc. - By 1696, Isaac Newton was completely well again. He became the Warden of the Mint that year and moved to London, where he lived for the next thirty years. - Newton was responsible for helping solve the currency crisis at the Mint. - In 1700, Isaac Newton became the Master of the Mint...this meant that he was head of the entire operation. - After Robert Hooke's death (Newton's lifelong nemesis), Isaac was elected president of the Royal Society in 1703. - Isaac Newton published his book Opticks in 1704, which discussed light and color.
 * - *Isaac Newton's collection of notes from his college years are housed at Cambridge University. They give people a very good indication of what interested Newton during his college years.**
 * - *It is also important to note that Isaac Newton spent a lot of time studying the Bible. Religion was very important to Newton. This is something that needs to be mentioned in the exhibit.**
 * - Newton decided to expand his work into a book, now famously known as the Principia.**
 * - Newton's universal law of gravitation: Every particle in the universe is attracted to every other particle. The force of their attraction is related to their masses and their distance apart from each other. All the motion in the solar system obeys the same law.**
 * -** The Principia is in three volumes.
 * - The Principia contains Newton's three laws of motion. They are again (1) Every object stays at rest unless it is acted on by an outside force. If it is in motion, it travels in a straight line unless it is acted on by an outside force. (2) The outside force is related to the direction and the increase in speed of the object. (3) To every action there is an equal an option reaction. *There is a cool activity with soccer balls that helps to demonstrate these laws. I will add it here Possible Interactive Activities.**

- In 1705, Isaac Newton was knighted by Queen Anne. - Isaac Newton attended his last Royal Society meeting on March 2, 1727. - Isaac Newton died on March 20, 1727. He was 84 years old. - The minutes for the Royal Society meeting on March 23 read, "The Chair being Vacant by the Death of Sir Isaac Newton there was no Meeting this Day." - Isaac Newton is buried in Westminster Abbey. - "I can calculate the motion of heavenly bodies, but not the madness of people." - Sir Isaac Newton, after losing a fortune in the 1720 South Sea Bubble.