Sir Benjamin Thompson alias Count Rumford was born on March 26, 1753.
Perhaps it was John Fowle, the Harvard educated village teacher who first noticed signs of talent in young Thompson—his skill with mechanical devices, his almost faultless command of language and grammar before his thirteenth year. These skills later
won him the right, along with friend and neighbour Loammi Baldwin, to attend Professor John Winthrop’s lectures on science at Harvard.
In England his scientific career prospered. While serving in the Government Colonial Office his scientific study and experiments, particularly with gunpowder, were so successful that he was elected in 1779, to the prestigious Royal Society. In 1783, through the intercession of Prince Maximilian, he was invited to accept a high post as a military/civilian advisor.
With the blessing of his English sponsors, Sir Benjamin accepted and was made Major-General of Calvary and Privy Councelor of state, Bavaria. Thompson then turned his talents to sound reform.
In 1791 Sir Benjamin Thompson was named a Count of the Holy Roman Empire. He assumed the title of Count Rumford.
A bronze statue of Count Rumford commissioned by the king of Bavaria in 1867 stands of Maximilian Strasse as testimony to the gratitude of the citizens of Munich. An exact replica, cast in the same foundry, was donated to the citizens of Woburn in 1900 by Marshall Tidd. It stands on the grounds.
Count Rumford in 1796 gave $5,000 each to the Royal Society of Great Britain and to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences to award medals every two years for outstanding scientific research on heat or light.
Among those who have received the Rumford Medal from the Royal Society are Humphry Davy, Michael Faraday, Louis Pasteur, James Maxwell, and John Tyndall. Among those who have received the award from the American Academy of Arts and Sciences are Josiah Gibbs, Thomas Edison, Albert Michelson, Irving Langmuir, Arthur Compton, Karl Compton, Enrico Fermi, and Edwin Land. The residue of this estate was left to Harvard University with which the present Rumford Professorship was established.
The Rumford Historical Association, Massachusetts was founded March 26, 1877, for the purpose of maintaining the birthplace of Benjamin Thompson as a site of historic interest. The birthplace contains reconstructed models of Count Rumford’s scientific experiments and inventions.
