Leeuwenhoek biography wikipedia
Autobiography wikipedia!
Antonie van Leeuwenhoek (1632 - 1723)
Antony Van Leeuwenhoek, c.1675 ©Van Leeuwenhoek was a Dutch textile merchant who became a pioneer of microbiology.
Antonie van Leeuwenhoek was born in Delft on 24 October 1632.
In 1648, van Leeuwenhoek was apprenticed to a textile merchant, which is where he probably first encountered magnifying glasses, which were used in the textile trade to count thread densities for quality control purposes.
Leeuwenhoek biography wikipedia
Aged 20, he returned to Delft and set himself up as a linen-draper. He prospered and was appointed chamberlain to the sheriffs of Delft in 1660, and becoming a surveyor nine years later.
In 1668, van Leeuwenhoek paid his first and only visit to London, where he probably saw a copy of Robert Hooke's 'Micrographia' (1665) which included pictures of textiles that would have been of interest to him.
In 1673, he reported his first observations - bee mouthparts and stings, a human louse and a fungus - to the Royal Society. He was elected a member of