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William Smith "The Father of Geology" (1769-1839) |
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William Smith was born in 1769 in Churchill, where his father
was a blacksmith.
He is buried in the churchyard of St Peter's Church, Northampton
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Smith's work established the chronological order of rock layers
in the United Kingdom, and the map he drew in 1815 of the
stratification
of the British Isles had extraordinary
repercussions - not just for science but religion too.
His
personal life, however, was not so successful. Overlooked
by the scientific community and his work plagiarised,
Smith was
financially ruined and he spent some time in a
debtors' prison.
It
was only later in his life that William Smith received the
recognition that he deserved.
The
touch screen exhibition in the Heritage Centre details this
extraordinary story,
together with examples of his revolutionary geological maps.
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