Johannes Gutenberg

Born Johannes Gensfleisch zur Laden zum Gutenberg around 1393-1406 in what would become Germany, he was an inventor and craftsman who saw that East Asia's movable type could be re-engineered for speed. He developed a process for mass-producing metal type from a lead-tin-antimony alloy that melted fast and cast sharp, built adjustable molds and a wooden press adapted from agricultural screw presses, and switched to oil-based ink that actually stuck to metal. The result was the printing press, and his proof of concept was the Gutenberg Bible - the first printed Bible, still regarded for its technical and aesthetic precision. The press spread across Europe and triggered an information revolution: literature became cheap, literacy widened, and the movements that reshaped the continent - Renaissance, Reformation, humanism - had a delivery system. He died on 3 February 1468. Five centuries later, Time Life named his invention the most important of the second millennium, and Mainz opened the Gutenberg Museum in 1900 to mark what he'd set in motion.