life, with the single exception that, embracing the
Christian religion, he was baptized "Robert Banneker;" and the record
of his death is thus preserved, in the family Bible: "_Robert Banneker
departed this life, July 'ye_ 10th 1759." Thus it is evident that he
took his wife's surname. Benjamin Banneker was the only child of
Robert and Mary Banneker.

Young Benjamin was a great favorite with his grandmother, who taught
him to read. She had a sincere love of the Sacred Scriptures, which
she did not neglect to inculcate into the youthful heart of her
grandson. In the neighborhood,--at that time an almost desolate
spot,--a school was conducted where the master admitted several
Colored children, with the whites, to the benefits of his
instructions. It was a "pay school," and thither young Banneker was
sent at a very tender age. His application to his studies was equalled
by none. When the other pupils were playing, he found great pleasure
in his books. How long he remained in school, is not known.

His father purchased a farm of one Richard Gist, and here he spent the
remnant of his days.

When young Banneker had obtained his majority, he gave attention to
the various interests of farm-life. He was industrious, intelligent in
his labors, scrupulously neat in the management of his grounds,
cultivated a valuable garden, was gentle in his treatment of
stock,--horses, cows, etc.,--and was indeed comfortably situated.
During those seasons of leisure which come to agriculturists, he
stored his mind with useful knowledge. Starting with the Bible, he
read history, biography, travels, romance, and such works on general
literature as he was able to borrow. His mind seemed to turn with
especial satisfaction to mathematics, and he acquainted himself with
the most difficult problems.

He had a taste also for mechanics. He conceived the idea of making a
timepiece, a clock, and about the year 1770 constructed one. With his
imperfect tools, and with no other model than a borrowed watch, it had
cost him long and patient labor to perfect it, to make the variation
necessary to cause it to strike the hours, and produce a concert of
correct action between the hour, the minute, and the second machinery.
He confessed that its regularity in pointing out the progress of time
had amply rewarded all his pains in its construction.[613]

In 1773 Ellicott & Co. built flour-mills in a valley near the banks of
the Patapsco River. Banneker watched t