Georg Christoph Lichtenberg

Georg Christoph Lichtenberg was born in Ober-Ramstadt, Germany in 1742, the youngest of 17 children. His intelligence was obvious from a young age, though his family could not afford an expensive education. However, a nobleman granted him the funds to enter Göttingen University in 1763. In 1769, Lichtenberg became a professor of physics at Göttingen, a position he held until his death. Lichtenberg also worked as a physicist, contributing to the field of electricity with the discovery of branching discharge patterns on dielectrics today known as Lichtenberg figures. He is also remembered for the notebooks he fastidiously kept, and which were published after his death.