Charles Darwin was born on February 12, 1809 in Shrewsbury, England. He was the fifth child of Dr. Robert Waring Darwin and Susannah Wedgwood Darwin. As a young child, he developed an interest in hunting and collecting rocks and insects. At the age of eight, barely starting day school, his mother died. His older sister Caroline soon became a mother figure to him. A year later, his father sent him and his older brother to Shrewsbury Grammar School, where they stayed for seven years. Then at the age of sixteen, he was enrolled in Edinburgh University, a highly respected medical school. After two years in the school, Charles found himself incredibly bored with the field of medicine. Also, the idea of surgery without an anesthetic repulsed him.

After his second year of medical school, his father realized that Charles was not cut out to be a doctor. He then sent Charles to Christ's College in Cambridge to become a clergyman. It was here that Darwin's fascination with biology devel

Then came what many consider to be the most important and influential part of his trip. This was the landing of the boat at the Galapagos Islands; an archipelago of black, volcanic islands about 600 miles off the coast of South America. Darwin discovered an array of animal life on the island and found that related but different species lived on different islands even though the islands were extremely similar geologically. He discovered many new species on these islands, but what astounded him most, rather than the difference between the species on the islands to the species on the mainland, was the difference amongst species on the islands. He couldn't understand, how animals of basically the same type, within the same environment, could be so differed. For instance, he found a large assortment of finches, small birds on these islands, but on each of the islands, the finches had a different variation of beak; some had thick, strong ones while others had thin, fine ones. It was only after many years of research that he realized that the birds' beaks had changed due to the food available. It amazed him that these animals could be in such close proximity and yet be so different. He later recalls, "I never dreamed that islands about fifty or sixty miles apart, and most of them in sight of each other, formed of precisely the same rocks, placed under a quite similar climate, rising to a nearly equal height, would have different kinds of animals" (source three). Not realizing it at the time, this experience on Galapagos was his first step in creating his theory of natural selection.

After collecting and sending many samples home the ship set sail to Australia, than around Africa, and then home to England. Throughout this time, Darwin's mind had been troubled by the mystery of the Galapagos, and he decided to sort it out when he arrived home. When the boat docked in England on October 2, 1936, five years after departure, Darwin was quite happy to be home. He was homesick throughout the trip and worse he had never truly gotten over the seasickness. Darwin moved to London where he began to sort out the specimens he had sent home, and all his notes. He wrote many scientific papers on coral reefs (which he had investigated in the Indian Ocean), volcanoes, and earthquakes. He wrote a small notebook on his theories of evolution but was afraid to make his views public. He was afraid that the Creationist society would reject his ideas if he had not gathered enough evidence. In 1939, he married his cousin, Emma Wedgwood. They lived in London for three and a half years but a sudden illness that came over Darwin forced them to move to the country.

Then finally, in 1854, at the age of forty-five, Darwin began work on his most important work of all: The Origin of Species. For the next year he wrote down many notes about t

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