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Banneker, Benjamin, 1731-1806

A negro mathematician; born in Maryland, Nov. 9, 1731. He taught himself mathematics; and for many years, while engaged in daily labor, made the necessary calculations for and published an almanac for Maryland and the adjoining States. Mr. Jefferson presented one of his almanacs to the French Academy of Sciences, where it excited wonder and admiration, and the African almanac became well known to the scientific circles of Europe. In 1790 he was employed by the commissioners in the survey of the boundaries of the District of Columbia. His grandmother was an Englishwoman, who purchased a small plantation in Maryland, bought two slaves from a ship just from Africa and married one of them. He died in Baltimore, in October, 1806.

Harper and Brothers Publishers. . New York. 1902.

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