Benjamin Thompson, later Count Rumford, is one of those forgotten giants. His personality, not always admirable, comes through in any writing about him. This is a good place to get some general knowledge and some titles for further reading.

http://www.dartmouth.edu/~library/Library_Bulletin/Apr1995/King_Rumford.html

When I was in high school, I had a very special history teacher, Russel Ayres. As a young man, he had taught John F. Kennedy and Adlai Stevenson. He could, as they say, make history come alive. He had the special ability of a true teacher to light sparks so that the students carried the flame out of the classroom, into their lives and perhaps provided sparks for others. My introduction to Thompson / Rumford was through him and he certainly enhanced my appreciation of the poetry of traditional music, the expression of the experience of generations of people distilled into rhythmn and rhyme.