Joseph Ritter von Fraunhofer (6 March 1787 – 7 June 1826) was a German physicist.
He was born in 1787 in Bavaria. When he was 11 years old, he had no father and no mother. Because of that, he had to work to survive. He worked making glass objects for a man called Philipp Anton Weichelsberger.
One day, in 1801, the place where Fraunhofer was working fell down and was destroyed. Fraunhofer was inside when this happened. Luckily, some people found him in the middle of the bits of the house and saved him. The Prince of Bavaria was with these people and he decided to help Fraunhofer.
The prince decided to give Fraunhofer money and books to study. He studied for five years and one day he was invited to work for a man called Joseph Utzschneider. This man had a company that made glass lenses to be used in scientific instruments. And this company had a secret laboratory in a monastery called Benediktbeuern. In this laboratory people were trying to discover how to make better glass lenses. Glass lenses at that time was a very complicated technology. After three years, Fraunhofer was one of the directors of this company. And after eight years he was a partner of the owner.
Fraunhofer died very sick in 1826, probably because of the time he worked as a child.