Exploring the Early History of Microscopes:

"Leeuwenhoek was a man with many talents, his most important attributes were creativity, power of observation, and ingenuity. Leeuwenhoek was a common man without any fortune or formal education, so he had to work for a living. Leeuwenhoek made simple (one lens) microscopes. He was not the first person to build a microscope, but the microscopes that he did build were the best ones for that time period. Leeuwenhoek was the first person to describe bacteria (from teeth scrapings), protozoans (from pond water), helped to prove the theory of blood circulation. He gained much of his inspiration form reading Hooke's Micrographia."

Founding fathers of microscopes. (n.d.). Retrieved Jan. 02, 2006, from http://www.southwestschools.org/jsfaculty/Microscopes/fathers.html.