William Gilbert, a physician who served Queen Elizabeth I of England, lived from 1544 to 1603. Before William Gilbert’s studies, all that was known about electricity and magnetism was that there were different ways to generate magnetism. First, there was a special stone that had magnetic properties. Some objects tended to be mysteriously attracted to it. Second, it was known that there were two special minerals that when rubbed together would also gain magnetic powers. In 1600, William Gilbert published his treatise De magnete, Magneticisique Corporibus (On the Magnet). Printed in Latin, the book explained all the years of Gilbert's research as well as his experiments on electricity and magnetism. Gilbert raised the level of interest in …show more content…
One of his first discoveries was that the power of an electromagnet could be strengthened by tightly winding insulated wire around an iron core. He was also the first person to make a magnet that could lift 3,500 pounds of weight. He paved the way for discoveries by other inventors such as Michael Faraday and William Sturgeon. Sturgeon kindly said, "Professor Joseph Henry has been enabled to produce a magnetic force which totally eclipses every other in the whole annals of magnetism, and no parallel is to be found since the miraculous suspension of the celebrated Oriental impostor in his iron coffin." In the course of his experiments with electromagnets, Joseph Henry discovered the principles of self-induction and mutual induction. According to Dictionay.com, self- induction is “the process by which an electromotive force is induced in a circuit by a varying current in that circuit”. Also, Dictionay.com defines mutual induction as, “the production of an electromotive force in one circuit by a change in current in another circuit.” Around 1826, Joseph Henry made a discovery of extreme importance. He discovered that in order to send electricity over a large distance he needed a higher voltage. He decided to combine this idea with electromagnetism to send messages over large distances. This discovery led to the invention of the