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On this Day:
In 1724, Glassblower Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit proposed a system for making thermometers as well as the Fahrenheit temperature scale in a paper to the Royal Society of London, and was elected a fellow on that basis.
Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit FRS (24 May 1686 – 16 September 1736) was a physicist, inventor, and scientific instrument maker. Fahrenheit was born in Danzig (Gdańsk), then a predominantly German-speaking city in the Pomeranian Voivodeship of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. He later moved to the Dutch Republic at age 15, where he spent the rest of his life (1701–1736) and was one of the notable figures in the Golden Age of Dutch science and technology.
A pioneer of exact thermometry, he helped lay the foundations for the era of precision thermometry by inventing the mercury-in-glass thermometer (first widely used, practical, accurate thermometer) and Fahrenheit scale (first standardized temperature scale to be widely used). In other words, Fahrenheit’s inventions ushered in the first revolution in the history of thermometry (branch of physics concerned with methods of temperature measurement). From the early 1710s until the beginnings of the electronic era, mercury-in-glass thermometers were among the most reliable and accurate thermometers ever invented.
Fahrenheit was born in Danzig (Gdańsk), then in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, but lived most of his life in the Dutch Republic. The Fahrenheits were a German Hanse merchant family who had lived in several Hanseatic cities. Fahrenheit’s great-grandfather had lived in Rostock, and research suggests that the Fahrenheit family originated in Hildesheim. Daniel’s grandfather moved from Kneiphof in Königsberg (present-day Kaliningrad) to Danzig and settled there as a merchant in 1650. His son, Daniel Fahrenheit (the father of Daniel Gabriel), married Concordia Schumann, the daughter of a well-known Danzig business family. Daniel was the eldest of the five Fahrenheit children (two sons, three daughters) who survived childhood. His sister, Virginia Elisabeth Fahrenheit, married Benjamin Krüger and was the mother of Benjamin Ephraim Krüger, a clergyman and playwright.
Daniel Gabriel began training as a merchant in Amsterdam after his parents died on 14 August 1701 from eating poisonous mushrooms. However, Fahrenheit’s interest in natural science led him to begin studies and experimentation in that field. From 1717, he traveled to Berlin, Halle, Leipzig, Dresden, Copenhagen, and also to his hometown, where his brother still lived. During that time, Fahrenheit met or was in contact with Ole Rømer, Christian Wolff, and Gottfried Leibniz. In 1717, Fahrenheit settled in The Hague as a glassblower, making barometers, altimeters, and thermometers. From 1718 onwards, he lectured in chemistry in Amsterdam. He visited England in 1724 and was the same year elected a Fellow of the Royal Society. From August 1736 Fahrenheit stayed in the house of Johannes Frisleven at Plein square in The Hague, in connection with an application for a patent at the States of Holland and West Friesland. At the beginning of September, he became ill and on the 7th his health had deteriorated to such an extent that he had notary Willem Ruijsbroek come to draw up his will. On the 11th the notary came by again to make some changes. Five days after that Fahrenheit died at the age of fifty. Four days later he received the fourth-class funeral of one who is classified as destitute, in the Kloosterkerk in The Hague (the Cloister or Monastery Church).
Fahrenheit scale
According to Fahrenheit’s 1724 article, he determined his scale by reference to three fixed points of temperature. The lowest temperature was achieved by preparing a frigorific mixture of ice, water, and a salt (“ammonium chloride or even sea salt”), and waiting for the eutectic system to reach equilibrium temperature. The thermometer then was placed into the mixture and the liquid in the thermometer allowed to descend to its lowest point. The thermometer’s reading there was taken as 0 °F. The second reference point was selected as the reading of the thermometer when it was placed in still water when ice was just forming on the surface. This was assigned as 30 °F. The third calibration point, taken as 90 °F, was selected as the thermometer’s reading when the instrument was placed under the arm or in the mouth.
Fahrenheit came up with the idea that mercury boils around 300 degrees on this temperature scale. Work by others showed that water boils about 180 degrees above its freezing point. The Fahrenheit scale later was redefined to make the freezing-to-boiling interval exactly 180 degrees, a convenient value as 180 is a highly composite number, meaning that it is evenly divisible into many fractions. It is because of the scale’s redefinition that normal mean body temperature today is taken as 98.6 degrees, whereas it was 96 degrees on Fahrenheit’s original scale.
The Fahrenheit scale was the primary temperature standard for climatic, industrial and medical purposes in English-speaking countries until the 1970s, nowadays replaced by the Celsius scale long used in the rest of the world, apart from the United States, where temperatures and weather reports are still broadcast in Fahrenheit (per Wikipedia).
First, a Story:
A student asked her professor: “What’s the difference between Fahrenheit and Celsius?”
He replied: “It’s a matter of degree…”
Second, a Song:
Foreigner is a British-American rock band, originally formed in New York City in 1976 by veteran British guitarist and songwriter Mick Jones and fellow Briton and ex-King Crimson member Ian McDonald, along with American vocalist Lou Gramm. Jones came up with the band’s name as he, McDonald and Dennis Elliott were British, whereas Gramm, Al Greenwood and Ed Gagliardi were American.
In 1977 Foreigner released its self-titled debut album, the first of four straight albums to be certified at least 5x platinum in the US. Foreigner peaked at No. 4 on the US album chart and in the Top 10 in Canada and Australia, while yielding two Top 10 hits in North America, “Feels Like the First Time” and “Cold as Ice”. Their 1978 follow-up, Double Vision, was even more successful peaking at No. 3 in North America with two hit singles, “Hot Blooded” a No. 3 hit in both countries, and the title track, a US No. 2 and a Canadian No. 7. Foreigner’s third album, Head Games (1979), went to No. 5 in North America producing two Top 20 singles, including its titletrack.
Reduced to a quartet, their album 4 (1981) hit No. 1 (for 10 weeks) in the US and No. 2 in Canada, while becoming Foreigner’s break-through album outside of North America, going Top 5 in the UK, Germany and Australia. Three of 4’s singles were hits: “Urgent” reached No. 1 in Canada and on the new US Rock Tracks chart, rose to No. 4 on the US Hot 100 and became their first Top 15 hit in Germany; the ballad “Waiting for a Girl Like You” peaked at No. 2 in both the US (for a record 10 weeks) and Canada, topped the US Rock Tracks chart and became their first Top 10 hit in the UK and Australia; and “Juke Box Hero” reached No. 3 on the Rock Tracks chart and the Top 30 on the Hot 100. In 1982 Foreigner released its first greatest hits album, Records, which has gone on to sell 7 million copies in the US. In 1984 Foreigner had its biggest hit single, the anthemic ballad “I Want to Know What Love Is”, which topped the US, UK, Canadian and Australian charts, while hitting No. 3 in Germany and the Top 10 in numerous other countries. Its source album, Agent Provocateur, was the band’s most successful in the UK, Germany and some other countries in Europe, where it peaked at No. 1, and in Australia where it peaked at No. 3, while making the Top 5 in the US and Canada.
After a break, Foreigner released Inside Information (1987), which despite the No. 6 US and Australian hit, “Say You Will” (which also rose to No. 1 on the US Rock Tracks chart), had a large sales drop-off, only hitting the Top 10 in a few European countries with a No. 15 peak in the US. The band’s most recent albums, Unusual Heat (1991), without Gramm, who departed due to the band’s shift towards the use of synthesizers, Mr. Moonlight (1994), with Gramm back on vocals, and Can’t Slow Down (2009), once again without Gramm, were not major sellers; the highest chart positions were obtained in Germany, where the last album peaked at No. 16. Foreigner is one of the world’s best-selling bands of all time with worldwide sales of more than 80 million records, including 37.5 million in the US. Leader Mick Jones has been for many years the only founding member still involved.
“Cold as Ice” is a 1977 song by British-American rock band Foreigner from their eponymous debut album. It became one of the best known songs of the band in the US, peaking at #6 on the Billboard Hot 100. It was initially the B-side of some versions of the “Feels Like the First Time” 45 rpm single.
The single version is a second shorter than the album version, but adds an orchestra track.
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ySb1f9zWJkQ)
Thought for the Day:
“The thermometer of success is merely the jealousy of the malcontents.” – Salvador Dali
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Have a great day!
Dave & Colleen
© 2021 David J. Bilinsky and Colleen E. Bilinsky
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