Most of us have heard the story that Isaac Newton "discovered" gravity when an apple fell from a tree and hit him on the head. There are a lot of misconceptions in this statement. First of all, Newton didn't "discover" gravity. Gravity was always here on Earth since the Earth's formation and people have always observed gravity in action. They just didn't know what the cause was. You can't discover something that everyone sees everyday. You can, however, explain it. That's what Newton did.
The story of an apple falling on Newton's head is a great story, but unfortunately there's no evidence to support it. Newton did reside on a farm with apple trees (hence the origin of Newton/apple tree story) and this may have initially brought up questions on why apples fall, but as it stands, there is no evidence whatsoever that he was hit on the head with an apple.
Sometimes stories that seem too silly or too good to be true, are not true. :-)
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