• Question: How was Electricity invented?

    Asked by Jeff Acer 42.0 to Claire, Liad, Ruth, Ryan, Mako on 22 Jun 2015.
    • Photo: Ruth Elderfield

      Ruth Elderfield answered on 22 Jun 2015:

      Electricity wasn’t so much invented as discovered. Humans knew about Lightening, static electricity and electric eels (and other fish) in ancient times across many different cultures (Egyptian and Arabic). The word Electricity didn’t get used until a few thousand years later in the 1600s.
      It was in the 18th and 19th centuries that electricity started to be harnessed and used by humans, that is when famous names such as Ohm, Ampere, Volta, Faraday, Franklin, Bell, Hertz, Tesla, Edison and even Einstein started to enter the picture. Some of the ways we measure electricity are names after these scientists and engineers.

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