Thomas-François Dalibard was born in
Crannes-en-ChampagneCrannes-en-Champagne is a commune in the Sarthe department in the Pays de la Loire region in north-western France.-References:*...
,
FranceFrance , officially the French Republic , is a country located in Western Europe, with several overseas islands and territories located on other continents. Metropolitan France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, and from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean...
in 1709 and died in 1799.
He first met
U.S.The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
scientistA scientist, in the broadest sense, is any person who engages in a systematic activity to acquire knowledge or an individual that engages in such practices and traditions that are linked to schools of thought or philosophy. In a more restricted sense, a scientist is an individual who uses the...
Benjamin FranklinBenjamin Franklin was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States of America. A noted polymath, Franklin was a leading author and printer, satirist, political theorist, politician, scientist, inventor, civic activist, statesman, soldier, and diplomat...
in 1767 during one of Franklin's visits to
FranceFrance , officially the French Republic , is a country located in Western Europe, with several overseas islands and territories located on other continents. Metropolitan France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, and from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean...
and it is said that they became friends.
In 1750,
Benjamin FranklinBenjamin Franklin was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States of America. A noted polymath, Franklin was a leading author and printer, satirist, political theorist, politician, scientist, inventor, civic activist, statesman, soldier, and diplomat...
published a proposal for an experiment to determine if
lightningLightning is an atmospheric discharge of electricity accompanied by thunder, which typically occurs during thunderstorms, and sometimes during volcanic eruptions or dust storms...
was
electricityElectricity is a general term that encompasses a variety of phenomena resulting from the presence and flow of electric charge...
. He proposed extending a
conductorIn science and engineering, an electrical conductor is a material which contains movable electric charges. In metallic conductors, such as copper or aluminum, the movable charged particles are electrons...
into a cloud that appeared to have the potential to become a
thunderstormA thunderstorm, also known as an electrical storm, a lightning storm, a hailstorm, or simply a storm is a form of weather characterized by the presence of lightning and its acoustic effect on the Earth's atmosphere known as thunder. The meteorologically-assigned cloud type associated with the...
.
Thomas-François Dalibard was born in
Crannes-en-ChampagneCrannes-en-Champagne is a commune in the Sarthe department in the Pays de la Loire region in north-western France.-References:*...
,
FranceFrance , officially the French Republic , is a country located in Western Europe, with several overseas islands and territories located on other continents. Metropolitan France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, and from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean...
in 1709 and died in 1799.
Relationship with Ben Franklin
He first met
U.S.The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
scientistA scientist, in the broadest sense, is any person who engages in a systematic activity to acquire knowledge or an individual that engages in such practices and traditions that are linked to schools of thought or philosophy. In a more restricted sense, a scientist is an individual who uses the...
Benjamin FranklinBenjamin Franklin was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States of America. A noted polymath, Franklin was a leading author and printer, satirist, political theorist, politician, scientist, inventor, civic activist, statesman, soldier, and diplomat...
in 1767 during one of Franklin's visits to
FranceFrance , officially the French Republic , is a country located in Western Europe, with several overseas islands and territories located on other continents. Metropolitan France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, and from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean...
and it is said that they became friends.
In 1750,
Benjamin FranklinBenjamin Franklin was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States of America. A noted polymath, Franklin was a leading author and printer, satirist, political theorist, politician, scientist, inventor, civic activist, statesman, soldier, and diplomat...
published a proposal for an experiment to determine if
lightningLightning is an atmospheric discharge of electricity accompanied by thunder, which typically occurs during thunderstorms, and sometimes during volcanic eruptions or dust storms...
was
electricityElectricity is a general term that encompasses a variety of phenomena resulting from the presence and flow of electric charge...
. He proposed extending a
conductorIn science and engineering, an electrical conductor is a material which contains movable electric charges. In metallic conductors, such as copper or aluminum, the movable charged particles are electrons...
into a cloud that appeared to have the potential to become a
thunderstormA thunderstorm, also known as an electrical storm, a lightning storm, a hailstorm, or simply a storm is a form of weather characterized by the presence of lightning and its acoustic effect on the Earth's atmosphere known as thunder. The meteorologically-assigned cloud type associated with the...
. If electricity existed in the cloud, the conductor could be used to extract it.
Experiments with electricity
Dalibard translated Franklin's proposal into French and in May of 1752 he performed an experiment using a 40-foot-tall metal rod at
Marly-la-VilleMarly-la-Ville is a town and a commune in the Val-d'Oise département, in the French region of Île-de-France.-References:* * -External links:* * *...
. It is said that Dalibard used wine bottles to ground the pole, and he successfully extracted electricity from a low cloud. Around a month later, in June 1752, unaware of Dalibard's work, Franklin also extracted electricity from a cloud in his famous kite experiment.
It was found later, by a descendant of Dalibard, that his findings were in fact published later than Franklin's.
Dalibard was the author of
Florae Parisiensis Prodromus, ou catalogue des plantes qui naissent dans les environs de Paris (Paris, 1749).