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Robert Hooke: London Surveyor
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After his father's death in 1648, Hooke was sent to London to attend boardingschool, where the headmaster recognized his potential and placed him in a curriculum that included Latin, Greek, and mathematics. Hooke attended Oxford in 1653. Though he never completed his bachelor's degree, it was at Oxford that Hooke met some of Britain's greatest scientists, around whom the British Royal Society would later form. Among these was the physicist Robert Boyle, forwhom Hooke served as a laboratory assistant. Under Boyle's tutelage Hooke constructed the precursor to the modern air pump, the first in a long line of ingenious scientific tools he would invent.
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In 1666, Hooke's life changed forever. The Great Fire of London resulted in a new career for Hooke as the surveyor of the City of London and as an architect and contractor in the rebuilding that followed for the next twenty years. Hooke immediately developed a plan for the rebuilding, and acted as the City of London's representative on an official Rebuilding Commission, which established the layout and rebuilding strategies and drew up the building regulations for an Act of Parliament. Throughout the rebuilding, Hooke was one of three people who were designated by the City to survey plots and settle boundary disputes. As well, Hooke became the first officer of Christopher Wren's architectural firm, which rebuilt all the major public buildings, including all the churches and many of the important secular halls as well. Wren and Hooke both designed new buildings, with Hooke in charge of the organization, contracts, etc., and a third man as the on-site coordinator.
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Born in 1635 on the Isle of Wight, Hooke belonged to an era of great scientific richness. His contemporaries included the experimentalist, Richard Boyle; the astronomer, Edmond Halley (of Comet fame); his staunch rival, Isaac Newton; and his great friend, the architect, Christopher Wren. Following the death of his father at the age of the 13, he came to London to seek his fortune. He was educated at Westminster School and continued his studies at Christ Church, Oxford, in 1653. In contrast to the other eminent scientists of his day, Hooke was not a gentleman so he had to earn a living by inventing instruments and doing experiments, effectively becoming England’s first ever professional scientist.
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Unfortunately, Hooke's many concurrent projects, and the necessary haste with which he did everything, meant that many of his ideas were never developed in depth. This led to several priority disputes, the most notable of which were with Isaac Newton. Hooke claimed that most of Newton's optical researches and his system of universal gravitation, which obeyed the inverse-square law, were in his own works. Hooke was no more belligerent or aggressive in pushing his claims than was common at the time, but Newton remained bitter. Hooke died in London on March 3, 1703, and during the 24 years after Hooke's death, when Newton was the dominant figure in the British scientific community, Hooke's reputation suffered. His true greatness was not generally recognized until the 20th century.
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In 1665 Hooke published Micrographia, a book describing his microscopic and telescopic observations, and some original work in biology. Hooke coined the term cell for describing biological organisms, the term being suggested by the resemblance of plant cells to monks' cells. The hand-crafted, leather and gold-tooled microscope he used to make the observations for Micrographia, originally constructed by Christopher White in London, is on display at the National Museum of Health and Medicine in Washington, DC.
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In Oxford, Hooke was lucky to secure the guidance and sponsorship of John Wilkins, the supervisor of Wadham College Wilkins had gathered around him a group of Royal Society students who were mostly superior to Hooke in status and age. Wilkins encouraged him to acquire their friendship, trust and appreciation, which turned out to be very important for his future. In 1658, Willis, a chemist, who ... employed Hooke as an assistant for his experiments, recommended him to Boyle, the greatest sponsor of Restoration science, to attend to his laboratory, near University College in London, and Hooke practically started his scientific career.
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London Surveyor