Born in 1765 in France, James Smithson was the illegitimate son of a prominent English duke (Hugh Percy, 1st Duke of Northumberland) and a direct lineal descendant of King Henry VII through his mother (Elizabeth Hungerford Keate Macie). Branded as a bastard, James was refused British citizenship and denied a rich inheritance through his true father. Due to this rejection the young Smithson felt constrained to succeed at whatever he did, and he became one of England’s leading scientists and a member of the Royal Society (the chief association of leading scientists) at the age of twenty-two.

In 1829 Smithson, who never married, died and left his considerable fortune to a nephew. Rumor had it that the terms of Smithson’s will stipulated that his entire estate was to go to one recipient upon …