Spectroscope
- Description
- Taking his newly-invented to Mount Whitney in the summer of 1881, Samuel Pierpont Langley investigated what he termed the “lower infra-red spectrum” of the sun. Becoming Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution in 1887, Langley set about establishing an Astrophysical Observatory to further research in this area. This two-prism spectroscope was part of the early equipment of that organization. The “Cambridge Scientific Instrument Company” inscription refers to a firm that was established in 1881, and that became the Cambridge Scientific Instrument Company Ltd. in 1895.
- Ref: Annals of the Astrophysical Observatory of the Smithsonian Institution 1 (1900): 32.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1881-1895
- maker
- Cambridge Scientific Instrument Company
- place made
- United Kingdom: England, Cambridge
- Measurements
- overall: 12 in; 30.48 cm
- overall: 11 1/2 in x 18 1/2 in x 19 1/4 in; 29.21 cm x 46.99 cm x 48.895 cm
- ID Number
- PH.314626
- catalog number
- 314626
- accession number
- 208046
- Credit Line
- Smithsonian Institution
- subject
- Science & Scientific Instruments
- See more items in
- Medicine and Science: Physical Sciences
- Science & Mathematics
- Optics
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History