Turing's Young Life:
In 1912, Alan Mathison Turing was born on the 23rd of June in Maida Vale, London, England. He was the second born child of the family. His brother was John Turing. His parents were Julius Mathison Turing and Ethel Sara Stony. As a kid, he showed some signs that would lead people to believe that he would have mild autism. He would always have trouble communicating with others because of his lack of social skills. Turing attended Sherborne Boarding School in 1926, when he was 13 years of age. During that year, there was a coal miner's strike, so they stopped going to work, and everyone stopped using public transportation. Turing had to get to his boarding school, 60 miles away, somehow. He was courageous enough to ride his bike that entire distance. There were many people who thought he was crazy, but he successfully accomplished the task, and that was the start of his problem-solving life. It was during his time at school, that young Turning realized he was interested in mathematics and science. He excelled in those topics because he was very interested in them. When Turing was 15, he met a man named Christopher Morcom who was a year older than he was. Christopher went to the same school Alan did, and they shared many of the same interests. Turning discovered that he was attracted to Christopher, as in he was interested in him on more than a friendly level. Sadly, although Christopher did not feel the same, they remained friends. Then, Morcom received a scholarship to the University of Cambridge's Trinity College, but he passed away on Feburuary 13, 1930, from bovine tuberculosis. He mistakenly drank infected milk. Turing was sad, but he was glad that Morcom had taught him to be more respectful and to be disciplined with his work. He started to get into long-distance running because it made him feel better when he was stressed or worried. During his last year at Sherborne, Turing received a scholarship to King's College in Cambridge, but he really wanted to a scholarship to the Trinity College that Christopher would have attended. Turing did end up going to King's College because their mathematics department was among the the best in the nation. He joined the school's boat club because he was always on the coast, and he also joined a political group called the Anti-war Council. They would organize strikes on munitions and chemical workers when the government was planning to go to war. In 1935, Turing was awarded a fellowship at King's College which he accepted. |
"Though he had been loved and understood in the narrower homely cycle of his preparatory school it was because I foresaw the possible difficulties for the staff and himself at public school that I was at such pains to find the right one for him, lest if he failed in adaptation to public school life he might become a mere intellectual crank." -Sarah Turing |