Charles Babbage's Birthday
Next: December 26, 2026
He designed the computer a century early.
The story
Where it comes from
Charles Babbage was born in London on 26 December 1791, and this Story marks his birthday. Troubled by the errors in printed mathematical tables, the Cambridge mathematician designed machines to calculate them automatically: the Difference Engines, and then the Analytical Engine, a general-purpose machine that could be programmed. He never completed any of them. Ada Lovelace's 1843 notes on the Analytical Engine showed how it could carry out a sequence of calculations, which is why she is often called the first programmer. Babbage died in 1871, insisting his ideas were sound.
How it's celebrated
There is no official observance, but his engines can still be seen. The Science Museum in London displays the Difference Engine No. 2 that its engineers built from his original drawings. At home, the anniversary is a fine excuse to show a child how a computer works, or to thank whoever fixes the family laptop.
Did you know
- Babbage designed Difference Engine No. 2 in 1847–49; the Science Museum finished its calculating section in 1991 for his bicentenary, and it worked exactly as he had predicted.
- The completed engine has 8,000 parts, weighs five tons and is worked by turning a hand crank.
- Babbage also pioneered lighthouse signalling and designed a cow-catcher for the front of railway locomotives.
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