Thomas Fuller 1710 - 1790 , African “slave” and mathematician.

Thomas Fuller was an African, shipped to America as a slave in 1724. He had remarkable powers of calculation, and late in his life was discovered by antislavery campaigners who used him as a demonstration that blacks are not mentally inferior to whites.

The place of his birth appears to have been between present day Liberia and Benin. Known as Negro Tom, we know that he was described as a very black man and also we know that he lived in Virginia after being brought to the United States as a slave.Certainly late in his life he was the property of Elixabeth Coxe of Alexandria.

Thomas Fuller, known as the Virginia Calculator, was stolen from his native Africa at the age of fourteen and sold to a planter. When he was about seventy years old, two gentlemen, natives of Pennsylvania, viz., William Hartshorne and Samuel Coates, men of probity and respectable characters, having heard, in traveling through the neighborhood in which the slave lived, of his extraordinary powers in arithmetic, sent for him and had their curiosity sufficiently gratified by the answers which he gave to the following questions: First, Upon being asked how many seconds there were in a year and a half, he answered in about two minutes, 47 304 000. Second: On being asked how many seconds a man has lived who is 70 years, 17 days and 12 hours old, he answered in a minute and a half 2 210 500 800. One of the gentlemen who employed himself with his pen in making these calculations told him he was wrong, and the sum was not so great as he had said - upon which the old man hastily replied: stop, master, you forget the leap year. On adding the amount of the seconds of the leap years the amount of the whole in both their sums agreed exactly.

Another question was asked and satisfactorily answered. Before two other gentlemen he gave the amount of nine figures multiplied by nine. … In 1790 he died at the age of 80 years, having never learned to read or write, in spite of his extraordinary power of calculation.

Present day thinking is that Fuller learned to calculate in Africa before he was brought to the United States as a slave. Supporting evidence for this comes from a passage written by Thomas Clarkson in 1788 describing the purchase of African slaves: “It is astonishing with what facility the African brokers reckon up the exchange of European goods for slaves. One of these brokers has ten slaves to sell , and for each of these he demands ten different articles. He reduces them immediately by the head to bars, coppers, ounces… and immediately strikes the balance. The European, on the other hand, takes his pen, and with great deliberation, and with all the advantage of arithmetic and letters, begin to estimate also. He is so unfortunate, as to make a mistake: but he no sooner errs, than he is detected by this man of inferior capacity, whom he can neither deceive in the name or quality of his goods, nor in the balance of his account.”

Despite Fuller’s calculating abilities he was never taught to read or write and again this is evidence that he did not learn to calculate while in the United States. When someone who had witnessed his calculating abilities remarked that it was a pity he had not been educated, Fuller replied: ‘It is best I got no learning; for many learned men be great fools.’ He died on 1790 in Alexandria, Virginia, USA.

Fascinating.

good

the last quote got me thinking. Africa's main problem has been selfishness. Our kings traded other people's sons and daughters and hid theirs. This era, politicians loot money meant for all for their families.
It's a pity we still hate ourselves.
If two men(a black and a white who look alike) are dressed the same way, Africans will reflexly prefer the white.
''Emancipate yourself from mental slavery''- Bob Marley

Got the bronze. TTC. I'm getting there.

incredible

ok.

Please sleep.

Abi that one dey nah..lol cool












Am

Indeed..Africa is blessed.

Never heard of him before, thanks poster

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He might have been taught by the gods you never cabln say .

Of course such people with incredible maths ability still abound in Africa.

Very interesting, never really heard or read about the dude.
This goes to show that Africans are/where really not as barbaric as our colonial bosses would want us to actually believe we were.
Call me a conspiracy theorist, but I believe in the wars to conquer different African tribes, the Europeans from the sea and the Arabs/jihadists from the north actually destroyed all/most traces of our heritage, obscured our history to whatever they wanted and those loads of crap was handed down to us by our forebearers.
Evidence like these goes to show that there was at least a semblance of education here be it however formal or informal.

Fuller replied: ‘It is best I got no learning; for many learned men be great fools.’
Words!!

If u c wen okada man dey calculate 'baba ijebu' u go know say diz guy na learner

Weldone op!

#though i did nt really read# bt May God crown ur efforts.....

How do we even know if this is true? Someone could have simply cooked this up. Or that was probably what the Slaveman was good at which his masters wanted to show off. Its not a bad hype tho.

FrontPage tinss! Yepaa,Mogbe,Mo kuu ooo!!! #Lmaoooo#

*Any1 wana chat 4d 9t....hit me!

We have got people with brains like supercomputers in Africa yet we are cursed with leaders who are complete idiots

Africans are really intelligent. We are only underrated by other races, even ourselves.

Complete nonsense

Una no dey sleep ni

This is for those blaming the whiteman for our present woes. Africans were fully involved in slavery, often leading raiding expeditions into villages and carting away their brothers and sisters to sell to the white slavers and domestic slavery.

Thomas Fuller was a genius whose ingenuity was sacrificed on the altar of a few coppers. Africans: We are our own worst enemy.

thanks op

Amazing, imagine how much such an a sharp and analytical brain could have contributed to academic community if given the opportunity ... what a shame.

Absolutely incredible!
Africans are superior race, smarter, resilient and thick-skinned. The whites know this and have exploited us via our greedy spots to ensure we are perpetually slaves... But Africa will rule the world in the very near future, before which, we must pass through very tough times.

how does this bring down shekau?




SMH




#sippingmyRedlabel

.

Proud to be an african.

creativeguru: Absolutely incredible!
Africans are superior race, smarter, resilient and thick-skinned. The whites know this and have exploited us via our greedy spots to ensure we are perpetually slaves... But Africa will rule the world in the very near future, before which, we must pass through very tough times.

when you stop worrying about which race is 'superior' and instead apply yourself to be the best you can be regardless of your skin colour, ethnicity, tribe etc then you can truly achieve greatness.
Stop blaming others for your failures.

Owkk...Continu!

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