KemetLeads
Benjamin Banneker
Self-taught astronomer, surveyor & almanac publisher
A free Black tobacco farmer who taught himself astronomy and wrote to Jefferson that liberty was not meant to be a monopoly.
The rise
The grandson of a formerly enslaved woman and a free Black farmer in Maryland, Banneker built a wooden clock entirely from hand-carved parts, then taught himself astronomy from borrowed books. He assisted Andrew Ellicott in surveying the boundaries of the new federal capital.