Science & Discovery
The inventions, voyages, discoveries, and Enlightenment thinkers who advanced human knowledge in 1776.
Every Science & Discovery article in the 1776 knowledge base. Use the topic filters to narrow by sub-topic.
Smallpox Inoculation in the Continental Army
George Washington's mandate requiring inoculation of Continental Army troops, establishing the fi...
Alessandro Volta's Discovery of Methane
In November 1776, the Italian physicist Alessandro Volta identified a flammable gas rising from t...
David Bushnell's Turtle: The First Submarine Used in Combat
On the night of September 6–7, 1776, Sergeant Ezra Lee piloted a hand-powered submersible vessel ...
David Hume's Death and Philosophical Legacy
David Hume, one of the most influential philosophers of the Scottish Enlightenment, died on Augus...
Captain Cook's Third Voyage
Captain James Cook's third and final Pacific expedition departed Plymouth, England, on July 12, 1...
David Rittenhouse in 1776 — Astronomer of the Revolution
David Rittenhouse (1732–1796) was America's foremost astronomer and instrument-maker of the Revol...
John Harrison and the Marine Chronometer
John Harrison, the English carpenter and self-taught clockmaker who solved the longitude problem ...
Lazzaro Spallanzani's Naturalist Work in 1776
Spallanzani's 1776 experimental work on animal reproduction and behavior advanced the understandi...
Lavoisier's Combustion Experiments of 1776
Lavoisier's quantitative combustion experiments in 1776 disproved phlogiston theory and founded m...
Buffon's Natural History: Revolutionizing Scientific Clas...
In 1776, the French naturalist Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon, continued his monumental *...