The following is taken from the IEEE publication, "Scanning the Past" which covers a reprint of an article appearing in the Proceedings of the IEEE Vol. 79, No. 9, September 1991

The Faraday Bicentennial

This month we observe the 200th anniversary of the birth of the eminent British natural philosopher, Michael Faraday (1791-1867), who made numerous contributions to electrical science including the discovery of electromagnetic induction and the introduction of the concept of the electromagnetic field.

Born in Newington, near London, England, Faraday was the son of a blacksmith. He wrote years afterward that "I love a Smith's shop and anything related to smithing" and his legendary experimental skill perhaps reflected this. His formal education was quite limited, but he took advantage of opportunities to attend public lectures and became an avid reader. Beginning when he was thirteen, he served an apprenticeship to a bookbinder. In 1813 he began his long career in science, when Sir Humphry Davy, the renowned chemist and lecturer at the Royal Institution in London, hired him as a laboratory assistant. Faraday learned much from Davy, who introduced him to leading scientists on the continent during an extended tour that ended in 1815.

In 1821, Faraday demonstrated an electric motor effect where the pole of a permanent magnet fixed at one end rotated around a current--carrying conductor. In 1825, he was appointed director of the Royal Institution laboratory and soon initiated a lecture series that helped to popularize science and increase scientific literacy. For many years, he presented an annual series of lectures to children during the Christmas season on topics such as the chemical history of a candle.

In 1831, Faraday made a major discovery by showing that relative motion between a magnet and a nearby conductor produced an electromotive force in the conductor. This principle let to the development of magneto-electric generators and, in the late 1860's, to the dynamo. An extensive series of experiments on dielectrics led Faraday to the idea of specific inductive capacity (dielectric constant). This research was the basis for the adoption of the farad as the unit of capacitance at an international electrical congress in 1891.

Faraday also did important investigation in the field of electrochemistry, discovering what became known as Faraday's Law of Electrolysis. He introduced such familiar terms to the electrical vocabulary as electrode, electrolyte, anode, cathode, and ion.

During the 1840's, Faraday discovered that a magnet could cause rotation of the plane of polarization of a beam of light and discussed a theory of the electromagnetic field that later was to be given mathematical form by James C. Maxwell. Underlying Faraday's experimental program was his general belief in the unity and convertibility of forces, including, gravitational as well as electric and magnetic. His friend and colleague, John Tyndall, wrote that Faraday 11 was incessantly theorizing" and that "theoretic ideas were the very sap of his intellect-the source from which all his strength as an experimenter was derived." Many of Faraday's more than 150 technical papers were included in his classic three-volume work, Experimental Researches in Electricity, which inspired Thomas A. Edison among others.

The Faraday bicentennial has stimulated numerous special events and observances. The British Post Office has issued a postage stamp in his honor, and a new 20-pound bank note features a portrait of Faraday. The British Science Museum has created a major exhibition on his work to open in the summer of 1991 and run for six months. A meeting of the American Chemical Society held in Atlanta, Georgia, in April 1991 included a symposium with several papers on Faraday as a chemist and popular lecturer. A bicentenary symposium on both Faraday and Charles Babbage was held at Cambridge University in July 1991. The Royal Institution, the Royal Society of Chemistry, the Institute of Physics, and the Institution of Electrical Engineers (IEE) plan special meetings near the time of the anniversary in September. The first volume of a planned series of Faraday's complete correspondence and at least two popular biographies are among the many publications to be issued in celebration of the bicentennial.

Since the power and communication systems of today are based to a considerable degree on Faraday's work, it is most appropriate that electrical engineers and scientists celebrate the bicentennial of his birth and reflect on his legacy.