Siemens’ founder made his first invention in a prison cell and begged to stay.
Werner Siemens, a Prussian artillery officer, got five years in Magdeburg’s citadel for acting as a second in a duel. In his cell, in 1842, he gold-plated a teaspoon and sold the process to a jeweler for forty louis d’or. A month in, a royal pardon arrived. He asked to stay a few more days and was put out at midnight.
Siemens on Brandseum