Georg Matthias Bose

[1] He was said to be a flamboyant demonstrator and an assiduous self-promoter, and he corresponded extensively with the Royal Society in London and with similar groups in Prussia, France, Italy and even Istanbul.

[2] Bose's initial prime conductor consisted of an assistant standing on a block of resin (an effective insulator) holding a metal bar in one hand while touching the spinning globe with the other.

Since water and fire were seen as direct opposites, this created a minor sensation among the observers and became widely mentioned in scientific correspondence.

[3] An attractive young lady was invited to stand on a block of insulating resin, and she was given a moderate static charge from a spinning globe.

I found in our armoury at Leipzic, [sic] a whole suit of armour, which was decked with many bullions of steel: some pointed like a nail: others in form like a wedge; others pyramidal.

Ewald Georg von Kleist had suspended a large stove-pipe above his machine on silk threads which, by coincidence rather than design, turned out to be the best possible shape and mass for a prime conductor in its ability to accumulate charge.

Nothing happened immediately, but while carrying the bottle back into a dark room he noticed a slight plasma glow which suggested to him that the alcohol was charged with St Elmo's fire.

Cunaeus and Allamand worked occasionally with the professor of physics at Leyden University, Pieter Musschenbroek on new electrical experiments, and it took time for them to discover the secret.

They finally worked out the importance of the outside conduction surface provided by the hand which was needed to prevent the development of electrostatic backpressure, and, as a result, it was the Leyden University experimenters who received the bulk of the credit.

[7] In 1760, during the Seven Years' War with Prussia, Bose was kidnapped from Wittenberg as a strategic asset, and taken to Magdeburg where he was held as a hostage.