Excerpt:
Michael Faraday, the discoverer of electro-magnetic induction, electro-magnetic rotations, the magneto-optical effect, diamagnetism, field theory and much else besides, was born in Newington Butts (the area of London now known as the Elephant and Castle) on 22 September 1791. His father, James, was a blacksmith and a member of the Sandemanian sect of Christianity. James Faraday had come to London in the late 1780s from North-West England. Very little is known of the first few years of Faraday's life. In an autobiographical note Faraday recalled that he had attended a day school and had learnt the "rudiments of reading, writing, and arithmetic".