Alfred Wegener Alfred Wegener was born in Berlin in 1880 and, after studying astronomy, took a keen interest in the new science of Meteorology (weather). He experimented with kites and balloons to learn more about the atmosphere. Wegener was one of the first people to look at a globe of the Earth and notice that the outlines of the continents could fit together. He came up with the theory that the continents were drifting but his ideas were not well accepted by the scientific community of the time. Today, we know that Wegener's ideas were correct.