The New Student's Reference Work/Weber, Wilhelm Eduard

Weber, Wilhelm Eduard, who has been called the Nestor of German physicists, was born at Wittenberg on the 24th of October, 1804. At the suggestion of Gauss he was appointed professor of physics at the University of Göttingen; but in 1837 he was compelled to resign on account of antagonism to the state authorities. Living for the next six years as a private citizen, he was in 1843 appointed to the chair of physics in the University of Leipsic; but he was recalled to his old post in Göttingen in 1849. The volume on The Theory of Waves (Wellenlehre), which he published with his brother, E. H. Weber, in 1825, is the first scholarly, experimental treatment of water-waves in existence. But perhaps Weber's chief service to science was the introduction of the absolute system of units into physical measurement — a work which he performed conjointly with Gauss. The invention of the earth-inductor and of the electrodynamometer is also due to Weber. As early as 1833 Gauss and Weber had connected the observatory and physical laboratory at Göttingen by means of a telegraph line. Weber died at Göttingen, June 23, 1891.