1812 in science
Encyclopedia
The year 1812 in science
Science
Science is a systematic enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe...

 and technology
Technology
Technology is the making, usage, and knowledge of tools, machines, techniques, crafts, systems or methods of organization in order to solve a problem or perform a specific function. It can also refer to the collection of such tools, machinery, and procedures. The word technology comes ;...

 involved some significant events, listed below.

Chemistry

  • Humphry Davy
    Humphry Davy
    Sir Humphry Davy, 1st Baronet FRS MRIA was a British chemist and inventor. He is probably best remembered today for his discoveries of several alkali and alkaline earth metals, as well as contributions to the discoveries of the elemental nature of chlorine and iodine...

     publishes Elements of Chemical Philosophy in London
    London
    London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

    .

Geophysics

  • February 7 - The last New Madrid Earthquake
    New Madrid earthquake
    The 1811-1812 New Madrid earthquakes were an intense intraplate earthquake series beginning with an initial pair of very large earthquakes on December 16, 1811. These earthquakes remain the most powerful earthquakes ever to hit the eastern United States in recorded history...

     strikes New Madrid, Missouri
    New Madrid, Missouri
    New Madrid is a city in New Madrid County, Missouri, 42 miles south by west of Cairo, Illinois, on the Mississippi River. New Madrid was founded in 1788 by American frontiersmen. In 1900, 1,489 people lived in New Madrid, Missouri; in 1910, the population was 1,882. The population was 3,334 at...

    , with an estimated moment magnitude
    Moment magnitude scale
    The moment magnitude scale is used by seismologists to measure the size of earthquakes in terms of the energy released. The magnitude is based on the seismic moment of the earthquake, which is equal to the rigidity of the Earth multiplied by the average amount of slip on the fault and the size of...

     of over 8.
  • March 26 - An earthquake
    1812 Caracas earthquake
    The 1812 Caracas earthquake took place in Venezuela on March 26, 1812 at 4:37 p.m. It measured 7.7 on the Richter magnitude scale. It caused extensive damage in Caracas, La Guaira, Barquisimeto, San Felipe, and Mérida...

     destroys Caracas
    Caracas
    Caracas , officially Santiago de León de Caracas, is the capital and largest city of Venezuela; natives or residents are known as Caraquenians in English . It is located in the northern part of the country, following the contours of the narrow Caracas Valley on the Venezuelan coastal mountain range...

    , Venezuela
    Venezuela
    Venezuela , officially called the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela , is a tropical country on the northern coast of South America. It borders Colombia to the west, Guyana to the east, and Brazil to the south...

    .

Mathematics, statistics and metrology

  • February 11 - Massachusetts
    Massachusetts
    The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...

     governor
    Governor
    A governor is a governing official, usually the executive of a non-sovereign level of government, ranking under the head of state...

     Elbridge Gerry
    Elbridge Gerry
    Elbridge Thomas Gerry was an American statesman and diplomat. As a Democratic-Republican he was selected as the fifth Vice President of the United States , serving under James Madison, until his death a year and a half into his term...

     invents gerrymandering
    Gerrymandering
    In the process of setting electoral districts, gerrymandering is a practice that attempts to establish a political advantage for a particular party or group by manipulating geographic boundaries to create partisan, incumbent-protected districts...

    .
  • February 12 - Napoleon authorises the usage of Mesures usuelles, the basis of the Metric System
    Metric system
    The metric system is an international decimalised system of measurement. France was first to adopt a metric system, in 1799, and a metric system is now the official system of measurement, used in almost every country in the world...

    .
  • Pierre-Simon Laplace
    Pierre-Simon Laplace
    Pierre-Simon, marquis de Laplace was a French mathematician and astronomer whose work was pivotal to the development of mathematical astronomy and statistics. He summarized and extended the work of his predecessors in his five volume Mécanique Céleste...

     publishes Théorie analytique des probabilités in which he lays down many fundamental results in statistics
    Statistics
    Statistics is the study of the collection, organization, analysis, and interpretation of data. It deals with all aspects of this, including the planning of data collection in terms of the design of surveys and experiments....

    .

Medicine

  • January - The New England Journal of Medicine is founded in Boston
    Boston
    Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...

    , Massachusetts
    Massachusetts
    The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...

    , by Dr John Collins Warren
    John Collins Warren
    John Collins Warren , of Boston, was one of the most renowned American surgeons of the 19th century. In 1846 he gave permission to William T.G. Morton to provide ether anesthesia while Warren performed a minor surgical procedure...

    .
  • January 21 - John Parkinson and his father James
    James Parkinson
    James Parkinson was an English apothecary surgeon, geologist, paleontologist, and political activist. He is most famous for his 1817 work, An Essay on the Shaking Palsy in which he was the first to describe "paralysis agitans", a condition that would later be renamed Parkinson's disease by...

     first describe appendicitis
    Appendicitis
    Appendicitis is a condition characterized by inflammation of the appendix. It is classified as a medical emergency and many cases require removal of the inflamed appendix, either by laparotomy or laparoscopy. Untreated, mortality is high, mainly because of the risk of rupture leading to...

     and resultant peritonitis
    Peritonitis
    Peritonitis is an inflammation of the peritoneum, the serous membrane that lines part of the abdominal cavity and viscera. Peritonitis may be localised or generalised, and may result from infection or from a non-infectious process.-Abdominal pain and tenderness:The main manifestations of...

     in English
    English language
    English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...

    .
  • Benjamin Rush
    Benjamin Rush
    Benjamin Rush was a Founding Father of the United States. Rush lived in the state of Pennsylvania and was a physician, writer, educator, humanitarian and a Christian Universalist, as well as the founder of Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania....

     publishes Medical Inquiries and Observations upon the Diseases of the Mind in Philadelphia, the first textbook on psychiatry
    Psychiatry
    Psychiatry is the medical specialty devoted to the study and treatment of mental disorders. These mental disorders include various affective, behavioural, cognitive and perceptual abnormalities...

     issued in the United States
    United States
    The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

    .
  • Cholera
    Cholera
    Cholera is an infection of the small intestine that is caused by the bacterium Vibrio cholerae. The main symptoms are profuse watery diarrhea and vomiting. Transmission occurs primarily by drinking or eating water or food that has been contaminated by the diarrhea of an infected person or the feces...

     in Jessore, India
    India
    India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

    .
  • Coffee
    Coffee
    Coffee is a brewed beverage with a dark,init brooo acidic flavor prepared from the roasted seeds of the coffee plant, colloquially called coffee beans. The beans are found in coffee cherries, which grow on trees cultivated in over 70 countries, primarily in equatorial Latin America, Southeast Asia,...

     is banned in Sweden
    Sweden
    Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....

    .

Paleontology

  • Samuel Thomas von Sömmerring publishes his description of Pterodactylus
    Pterodactylus
    Pterodactylus is a genus of pterosaurs, whose members are popularly known as pterodactyls. It was the first to be named and identified as a flying reptile...

     which he names Ornithocephalus antiquus.
  • Georges Cuvier
    Georges Cuvier
    Georges Chrétien Léopold Dagobert Cuvier or Jean Léopold Nicolas Frédéric Cuvier , known as Georges Cuvier, was a French naturalist and zoologist...

     publishes Recherches sur les ossements fossiles de quadrupèdes in Paris
    Paris
    Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

    .

Technology

  • February 27 - Poet
    Poet
    A poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...

     Lord Byron
    George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron
    George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron, later George Gordon Noel, 6th Baron Byron, FRS , commonly known simply as Lord Byron, was a British poet and a leading figure in the Romantic movement...

     gives his first address as a member of the House of Lords
    House of Lords
    The House of Lords is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster....

    , in defense of Luddite
    Luddite
    The Luddites were a social movement of 19th-century English textile artisans who protested – often by destroying mechanised looms – against the changes produced by the Industrial Revolution, which they felt were leaving them without work and changing their way of life...

     violence against Industrialism in his home county of Nottinghamshire
    Nottinghamshire
    Nottinghamshire is a county in the East Midlands of England, bordering South Yorkshire to the north-west, Lincolnshire to the east, Leicestershire to the south, and Derbyshire to the west...

    .
  • March 15 - Luddites attack wool
    Wool
    Wool is the textile fiber obtained from sheep and certain other animals, including cashmere from goats, mohair from goats, qiviut from muskoxen, vicuña, alpaca, camel from animals in the camel family, and angora from rabbits....

     processing factory of Frank Vickerman
    Frank Vickerman
    Frank Vickerman was a man in the early 19th century who lived in West Yorkshire. He owned a wool processing factory at Taylor Hill, which was attacked by the Luddites on March 15, 1812. The factory was destroyed and arson was attempted...

     in West Yorkshire
    West Yorkshire
    West Yorkshire is a metropolitan county within the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England with a population of 2.2 million. West Yorkshire came into existence as a metropolitan county in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972....

    .
  • May 25 - Felling mine disaster
    Felling mine disaster
    Felling mine disaster was a major mining accident in Britain, claiming 92 lives on 25 May 1812.The colliery was situated in Felling, Tyne and Wear, part of Gateshead, in what used to be County Durham, and had two shafts about 600 feet deep. It was extended in 1810 by the opening up of a new coal...

    : Mine explosion at Felling colliery near Jarrow
    Jarrow
    Jarrow is a town in Tyne and Wear, England, located on the River Tyne, with a population of 27,526. From the middle of the 19th century until 1935, Jarrow was a centre for shipbuilding, and was the starting point of the Jarrow March against unemployment in 1936.-Foundation:The Angles re-occupied...

    , England
    England
    England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

     - 96 dead.
  • August - Henry Bell's begins a passenger service on the River Clyde
    River Clyde
    The River Clyde is a major river in Scotland. It is the ninth longest river in the United Kingdom, and the third longest in Scotland. Flowing through the major city of Glasgow, it was an important river for shipbuilding and trade in the British Empire....

     in Scotland
    Scotland
    Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...

    , the first commercially successful steamboat
    Steamboat
    A steamboat or steamship, sometimes called a steamer, is a ship in which the primary method of propulsion is steam power, typically driving propellers or paddlewheels...

     service in Europe
    Europe
    Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

    .
  • August 12 - The Middleton Railway
    Middleton Railway
    The Middleton Railway is the world's oldest continuously working railway. It was founded in 1758 and is now a heritage railway run by volunteers from The Middleton Railway Trust Ltd...

    , serving coal
    Coal
    Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock usually occurring in rock strata in layers or veins called coal beds or coal seams. The harder forms, such as anthracite coal, can be regarded as metamorphic rock because of later exposure to elevated temperature and pressure...

     pits at Leeds
    Leeds
    Leeds is a city and metropolitan borough in West Yorkshire, England. In 2001 Leeds' main urban subdivision had a population of 443,247, while the entire city has a population of 798,800 , making it the 30th-most populous city in the European Union.Leeds is the cultural, financial and commercial...

     in England
    England
    England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

    , becomes the first to use steam locomotive
    Steam locomotive
    A steam locomotive is a railway locomotive that produces its power through a steam engine. These locomotives are fueled by burning some combustible material, usually coal, wood or oil, to produce steam in a boiler, which drives the steam engine...

    s successfully in regular service. The first locomotive, Salamanca, is also the first to use two cylinder
    Cylinder (steam locomotive)
    The cylinders of a steam locomotive are the components that convert the power stored in the steam into motion.Cylinders may be arranged in several different ways.-Early locomotives:...

    s and has a rack railway
    Rack railway
    A rack-and-pinion railway is a railway with a toothed rack rail, usually between the running rails. The trains are fitted with one or more cog wheels or pinions that mesh with this rack rail...

     mechanism devised by John Blenkinsop
    John Blenkinsop
    John Blenkinsop was an English mining engineer and an inventor of steam locomotives, who designed the first practical railway locomotive....

     and built by Matthew Murray
    Matthew Murray
    Matthew Murray was an English steam engine and machine tool manufacturer, who designed and built the first commercially viable steam locomotive, the twin cylinder Salamanca in 1812...

    .
  • August 19 - War of 1812
    War of 1812
    The War of 1812 was a military conflict fought between the forces of the United States of America and those of the British Empire. The Americans declared war in 1812 for several reasons, including trade restrictions because of Britain's ongoing war with France, impressment of American merchant...

    : defeats the British
    United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland
    The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland was the formal name of the United Kingdom during the period when what is now the Republic of Ireland formed a part of it....

     frigate
    Frigate
    A frigate is any of several types of warship, the term having been used for ships of various sizes and roles over the last few centuries.In the 17th century, the term was used for any warship built for speed and maneuverability, the description often used being "frigate-built"...

     Guerrière off the coast of Nova Scotia
    Nova Scotia
    Nova Scotia is one of Canada's three Maritime provinces and is the most populous province in Atlantic Canada. The name of the province is Latin for "New Scotland," but "Nova Scotia" is the recognized, English-language name of the province. The provincial capital is Halifax. Nova Scotia is the...

    . British shot is said to have bounced off Constitutions sides, earning her the nickname "Old Ironsides".
  • Philippe Girard invents a flax
    Flax
    Flax is a member of the genus Linum in the family Linaceae. It is native to the region extending from the eastern Mediterranean to India and was probably first domesticated in the Fertile Crescent...

    -spinning machine.
  • The Old Oscar Pepper Distillery (now the Labrot & Graham Distillery), the oldest Kentucky
    Kentucky
    The Commonwealth of Kentucky is a state located in the East Central United States of America. As classified by the United States Census Bureau, Kentucky is a Southern state, more specifically in the East South Central region. Kentucky is one of four U.S. states constituted as a commonwealth...

     Bourbon
    Bourbon whiskey
    Bourbon is a type of American whiskey – a barrel-aged distilled spirit made primarily from corn. The name of the spirit derives from its historical association with an area known as Old Bourbon, around what is now Bourbon County, Kentucky . It has been produced since the 18th century...

     distillery, is established along Glenn's Creek in Woodford County, Kentucky
    Woodford County, Kentucky
    Woodford County is a county located in the heart of the Bluegrass region of the U.S. state of Kentucky. As of 2000, the population was 23,208. Its county seat is Versailles. The county is named for General William Woodford, who was with General George Washington at Valley Forge...

    .

Births

  • March 12 - Joseph Prestwich
    Joseph Prestwich
    Sir Joseph Prestwich FRS, was a British geologist and businessman, known as an expert on the Tertiary Period and for having confirmed the findings of Boucher de Perthes of ancient flint tools in the Somme valley gravel beds....

    , English
    English people
    The English are a nation and ethnic group native to England, who speak English. The English identity is of early mediaeval origin, when they were known in Old English as the Anglecynn. England is now a country of the United Kingdom, and the majority of English people in England are British Citizens...

     geologist
    Geologist
    A geologist is a scientist who studies the solid and liquid matter that constitutes the Earth as well as the processes and history that has shaped it. Geologists usually engage in studying geology. Geologists, studying more of an applied science than a theoretical one, must approach Geology using...

     (d. 1896
    1896 in science
    The year 1896 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Mathematics:* The prime number theorem on the distribution of primes is proved.* Charles L...

    )
  • March 20 - Charles Vincent Walker
    Charles Vincent Walker
    Charles Vincent Walker FRS was an English electrical engineer and publisher, a major influence on the development of railway telecommunications, he was also the first person to send a submarine telegraph signal.-Life:...

    , English telegraph engineer (d. 1882
    1882 in science
    The year 1882 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Biology:* Robert Koch isolates the Tuberculosis bacillus.* Élie Metchnikoff discovers phagocytosis.-Chemistry:...

    )
  • March 24 - Robert Gordon Latham
    Robert Gordon Latham
    Robert Gordon Latham FRS was an ethnologist and philologist.Born at Billingborough, Lincolnshire, Latham studied philology in Scandinavia. He graduated from King's College, Cambridge in 1833, becoming a Fellow of King's...

    , English ethnologist and philologist (d. 1888
    1888 in science
    The year 1888 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Astronomy:* January 3 - The 91 cm refracting telescope at Lick Observatory is first used...

    )
  • May 10 - William Henry Barlow
    William Henry Barlow
    On 28 December 1879, the central section of the North British Railway's bridge across the River Tay near Dundee collapsed in the Tay Bridge disaster as an express train crossed it in a heavy storm. All 75 passengers and crew on the train were killed...

    , English railway civil engineer
    Civil engineer
    A civil engineer is a person who practices civil engineering; the application of planning, designing, constructing, maintaining, and operating infrastructures while protecting the public and environmental health, as well as improving existing infrastructures that have been neglected.Originally, a...

     (d. 1902
    1902 in science
    The year 1902 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Aeronautics:*May 15 - Lyman Gilmore claims to have flown his steam-powered fixed-wing aircraft, although his proof was supposedly destroyed in a 1935 fire.-Chemistry:...

    )
  • June 9 - Johann Gottfried Galle
    Johann Gottfried Galle
    Johann Gottfried Galle was a German astronomer at the Berlin Observatory who, on 23 September 1846, with the assistance of student Heinrich Louis d'Arrest, was the first person to view the planet Neptune, and know what he was looking at...

    , German astronomer
    Astronomer
    An astronomer is a scientist who studies celestial bodies such as planets, stars and galaxies.Historically, astronomy was more concerned with the classification and description of phenomena in the sky, while astrophysics attempted to explain these phenomena and the differences between them using...

     (d. 1910
    1910 in science
    The year 1910 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Chemistry:* Albert Einstein and Marian Smoluchowski find the Einstein-Smoluchowski formula for the attenuation coefficient due to density fluctuations in a gas...

    )

Deaths

  • February 24 - Étienne-Louis Malus
    Étienne-Louis Malus
    - External links :...

    , French
    French people
    The French are a nation that share a common French culture and speak the French language as a mother tongue. Historically, the French population are descended from peoples of Celtic, Latin and Germanic origin, and are today a mixture of several ethnic groups...

     physicist
    Physicist
    A physicist is a scientist who studies or practices physics. Physicists study a wide range of physical phenomena in many branches of physics spanning all length scales: from sub-atomic particles of which all ordinary matter is made to the behavior of the material Universe as a whole...

     (b. 1775
    1775 in science
    The year 1775 in science and technology involved some significant events.-Events:*February 21 - La Specola, Florence's Museum of Zoology and Natural History, opens to the public.-Chemistry:...

    )
  • May 9 - Charles-Nicolas-Sigisbert Sonnini de Manoncourt
    Charles-Nicolas-Sigisbert Sonnini de Manoncourt
    Charles-Nicolas-Sigisbert Sonnini de Manoncourt was a French naturalist. Between 1799 to 1808 he wrote 127 volumes of the Histoire naturelle. Noteworthy among these, especially for herpetologists, is Histoire naturelle des Reptiles, avec figures desinées d'après nature, in four volumes, which he...

    , French naturalist
    Naturalist
    Naturalist may refer to:* Practitioner of natural history* Conservationist* Advocate of naturalism * Naturalist , autobiography-See also:* The American Naturalist, periodical* Naturalism...

     (b. 1751
    1751 in science
    The year 1751 in science and technology involved some significant events.#-Astronomy:* The globular cluster 47 Tucanae , visible with the unaided eye from the southern hemisphere, is discovered by the French astronomer Nicolas Louis de Lacaille, who catalogues it in his list of southern nebulous...

    )
  • June 22 - Richard Kirwan
    Richard Kirwan
    Richard Kirwan FRS was an Irish scientist. He is remembered today, if at all, for being one of the last supporters of the theory of phlogiston. Kirwan was active in the fields of chemistry, meteorology, and geology...

    , Irish
    Irish people
    The Irish people are an ethnic group who originate in Ireland, an island in northwestern Europe. Ireland has been populated for around 9,000 years , with the Irish people's earliest ancestors recorded having legends of being descended from groups such as the Nemedians, Fomorians, Fir Bolg, Tuatha...

     scientist (b. 1733
    1733 in science
    The year 1733 in science and technology involved some significant events.-Physiology and medicine:* Rev. Stephen Hales publishes Hæmastaticks, the second volume of his Statical Essays, in London, containing the results of his experiments in measuring blood pressure.-Inventions:* May 26 - The flying...

    )
  • July 10 - Carl Ludwig Willdenow
    Carl Ludwig Willdenow
    Carl Ludwig Willdenow was a German botanist, pharmacist, and plant taxonomist. He is considered one of the founders of phytogeography, the study of the geographic distribution of plants...

    , German botanist (b. 1765
    1765 in science
    The year 1765 in science and technology involved some significant events.-Technology:* James Watt makes a breakthrough in the development of the steam engine by constructing a model with a separate condenser.-Births:...

    )
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