September 16: Mathematics, Science, and Wrestling

Stephen Hawking was once quoted as saying that "Galileo, perhaps more than any other single person, was responsible for the birth of modern science." He was known as the father of modern observational astronomy, the father of modern physics, the father of science, and the father of modern science. Only Father Christmas is a more celebrated parental figure in the history of the world.

Born the first of six children in Pisa, Italy to Vincenzo Galilei and Giulia Ammannati, Galileo Gary Galilei was just your average kid. He could be found playing stick ball with his friends in the neighborhood cul-de-sac every day after school until the sun descended over the horizon of the center of the universe before he was forced to finish his homework. He got in trouble just like any other boy growing up in the sixties and seventies of the sixteenth century. Often times the neighborhood stick ball tournament would be interrupted by Giulia storming out of the house demanding that Galileo clean his room; the same room she had requested to be cleaned twice the night before.

For all intents and purposes, though, Galileo was a good boy. He loved his mom and dad and never meant to disobey them. Occasionally his curiosity would distract him, but on the whole, he did what he was told. He hated school but he went because his parents worked hard to provide him and his siblings the education they were deprived of. He scored average marks in arithmetic and the sciences, but it was the high school wrestling team where he excelled. In fact, to this day, Galileo still holds the record for fastest pin time at Pisa High. If it weren't for the full scholarship he received from the University of Pisa for his accolades in the sport, he may never have turned out to be the genius we all know him for.

While enrolled in the university, Galileo juggled his time between wrestling, his studies, and mopping the halls as a part time janitor. It was during a late night mop through the mathematics building in the spring of 1582 that Galileo came across a blackboard with a challenge to the students of an upper division course. Scrolled in white chalk across the top border of the dark green surface was a simple request: "This is a problem that took my colleagues and me more than two years to prove. I'm hoping that one of you might prove it by the end of the semester." Galileo dropped his mop, picked up the lone piece of chalk, and altered the course of his life.

Galileo Gary Galilei was remembered for his countless and distinguished accomplishments. The telescope, astronomical observations, and the still standing record at Pisa High. But it was his continual support for Copernicanism that ultimately landed him in trouble. It was his public displays of support for the heliocentric view that caused two philosophers and clerics to denounce him to the Roman Inquisition. The identities of the tattletales were never released, but many speculate that one of them was Galileo's opponent in that fateful wrestling match.

Galileo was never the quiet type. He loved to brag about his accomplishments and he wasn't shy about his views on Earth not being at the center of the universe. After his denouncement, the Catholic Church announced they would drop the charges if he promised to abandon his support for the controversial theory, but his hubris wouldn't go down without a fight. Sixteen years later, Galileo published Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems. Upon publication, the Inquisition concluded he was a suspect of heresy and forced him to live the final ten years of his life under house arrest.

The irony for a man that knew so much about planets, stars, solar systems, and wrestling, was that he didn't have a clue about every day household matters; and now he was forced to live in a world of such issues. He didn't know the first thing about patching holes in walls or fixing an Internet connection. When he clogged the toilet, he had to call the neighbor to plunge it clean. For ten years, Galileo lived a life of darkness and when his body was discovered, the house he had been forced to live in was in a complete disarray.

Galileo Gary Galilei lived an incredible life until his arrest. Respected in mathematics, sciences, and barbaric athletics it is often wondered what finally did him in. Was it the embarrassment of not knowing how to unclog a toilet? Was it natural causes or did his biggest rival in the wrestling world get the last laugh by making the final pin?