1676
Leeuwenhoek Sees Microorganisms
The Dutch draper and amateur microscope-maker Antonie van Leeuwenhoek, grinding single-lens microscopes of extraordinary power, looked at a drop of pond water and saw thousands of tiny creatures swimming. He called them animalcules. Microbiology had begun, although no one yet understood what it would mean for medicine, and two centuries would pass before Pasteur and Koch connected microbes to disease.
Death of King Philip
Metacom was shot by a Christianized Wampanoag named Alderman in a swamp on Mount Hope, Rhode Island, ending major fighting in King Philip's War. His body was quartered; his head was displayed on a pike in Plymouth for two decades. Native power in southern New England was effectively finished, and the region's indigenous population was reduced to a scattered remnant.
Romer Measures the Speed of Light
The Danish astronomer Ole Romer, observing the eclipses of Jupiter's moons, noticed that the timings varied with the Earth's distance from Jupiter. He correctly concluded that light had a finite speed and estimated it at roughly two hundred thousand kilometers per second, not far from the true value. The ancient assumption that light traveled instantaneously was overturned by careful observation.
Bacon's Rebellion
The frustrated planter Nathaniel Bacon led a Virginia militia against colonial authorities, demanding more aggressive warfare against Native Americans and less oligarchic rule. His men burned Jamestown before he died of dysentery and the rising collapsed. The crisis pushed Virginia's planters toward African rather than European indentured labor, accelerating the colony's transition to a fully racialized slave society.