Measuring & Mapping - Overview
Where, how far, and how much? People have invented an astonishing array of devices to answer seemingly simple questions like these. Measuring and mapping objects in the Museum's collections include the instruments of the famous—Thomas Jefferson's thermometer and a pocket compass used by Meriwether Lewis and William Clark on their expedition across the American West. A timing device was part of the pioneering motion studies of Eadweard Muybridge in the late 1800s. Time measurement is represented in clocks from simple sundials to precise chronometers for mapping, surveying, and finding longitude. Everyday objects tell part of the story, too, from tape measures and electrical meters to more than 300 scales to measure food and drink. Maps of many kinds fill out the collections, from railroad surveys to star charts.
"Measuring & Mapping - Overview" showing 653 items.
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Engraved printing plate "Pleiodus strigirostris"
- Description
- William H. Dougal (1822–1895) of New York and Washington, D.C., (after 1844) engraved this copper printing plate after a drawing by Expedition Naturalist Titian Ramsey Peale. The image depicts the Pleiodus strigirostris (now Didunculus strigirostris, Tooth billed pigeon or Samoan Pigeon). The engraved illustration was published as Plate 34 in Volume VIII, Mammalogy and Ornithology, by John Cassin, 1858.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1858
- publisher
- Wilkes, Charles
- original artist
- Peale, Titian Ramsay
- graphic artist
- Dougal, William H.
- printer
- Sherman, Conger
- author
- Cassin, John
- ID Number
- 1999.0145.414
- catalog number
- 1999.0145.414
- accession number
- 1999.0145
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Engraved printing plate "Scolopax meridionalis, Zaporina umbrina"
- Description
- William H. Dougal (1822–1895) of New York and Washington, D.C. (after 1844) engraved this copper printing plate after drawings by William E. Hitchcock. The image depicts the Scolopax meridionalis (now Galinago shicklandii, or Cordilleran snipe) and Zapornia umbrina (now Porzana porzana, or Spotted Crake). The engraved illustration was published as Plate 35 in Volume VIII, Mammalogy and Ornithology, by John Cassin, 1858.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1858
- publisher
- Wilkes, Charles
- original artist
- Hitchcock, W. E.
- graphic artist
- Dougal, William H.
- printer
- Sherman, Conger
- author
- Cassin, John
- maker
- Peale, Titian Ramsay
- ID Number
- 1999.0145.415
- catalog number
- 1999.0145.415
- accession number
- 1999.0145
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Engraved printing plate "Procellaria nivea"
- Description
- The firm of Rawdon, Wright, Hatch and Edson (1830s–1850s) of New York City prepared this copper printing plate after a drawing by Expedition Naturalist Titian Ramsey Peale. It depicts the Procellaria nivea (now Pagodroma nivea or Snow Petrel). The engraved illustration was published as Plate 42 in Volume VIII, Mammalogy and Ornithology, by John Cassin, 1858.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1858
- publisher
- Wilkes, Charles
- original artist
- Peale, Titian Ramsay
- graphic artist
- Rawdon, Wright, Hatch and Edson
- printer
- Sherman, Conger
- author
- Cassin, John
- maker
- Peale, Titian Ramsay
- ID Number
- 1999.0145.422
- accession number
- 1999.0145
- catalog number
- 1999.0145.422
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Engraved printing plate "Ichthyology, Pl."
- Description
- William H. Dougal (1822–1895) of New York and Washington, D.C., (after 1844) engraved this copper printing plate depicting four species of fish documented by the U.S. Exploring Expedition. The illustrations were to be published in Volumes XXII and XXIII, Ichthyology, by Louis Agassiz. Dougal engraved 26 of the 28 plates for this volume which was never printed.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1849
- 1862
- publisher
- Wilkes, Charles
- original artist
- Drayton, Joseph
- graphic artist
- Dougal, William H.
- author
- Agassiz, Louis
- ID Number
- 1999.0145.435
- accession number
- 1999.0145
- catalog number
- 1999.0145.435
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Engraved printing plate "Ichthyology, Pl."
- Description
- William H. Dougal (1822–1895) of New York and Washington, D.C., (after 1844) engraved this copper printing plate depicting three species of shark documented by the U.S. Exploring Expedition. The engraved illustrations were to be published in volumes XXII and XXIII, Ichthyology, by Louis Agassiz. Dougal engraved 26 of the 28 plates for this volume which was never printed.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1849
- publisher
- Wilkes, Charles
- original artist
- Drayton, Joseph
- graphic artist
- Dougal, William H.
- author
- Agassiz, Louis
- ID Number
- 1999.0145.437
- accession number
- 1999.0145
- catalog number
- 1999.0145.437
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
John Deere
- Description (Brief)
- A tape measure in a celluloid case of cream celluloid with yellow and green on the front and back. Advertising copy for the John Deere Company includes a profile portrait of John Deere with the message, "He gave to the world the steel plow," underneath. The other side bears the John Deere logo.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1917
- advertiser
- Deere & Company
- depicted
- Deere, John
- maker
- Parisian Novelty Company
- ID Number
- 2006.0098.0927
- accession number
- 2006.0098
- catalog number
- 2006.0098.0927
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Dr. Miles Anti Pain Pills
- Description (Brief)
- Circular tape measure. A cream-colored celluloid case with purple print reading "Dr. Miles' Medical Co. For Headache Elkhart, Ind." on one side and "For Relief of Any Pain" on the other side. On one side is an image of a vial package of pain pills. The tabe is cloth with a metal tab.
- advertiser
- Dr. Miles Medical Company
- maker
- Parisian Novelty Company
- ID Number
- 2006.0098.1538
- catalog number
- 2006.0098.1538
- accession number
- 2006.0098
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Duboscq Colorimeter
- Description
- Louis Jules Duboscq, a French instrument maker, made a colorimeter for a professor of industrial chemistry at the Commercial College in Paris in 1854. Duboscq's was not the first colorimeter on the market but it was, he would later claim, the first that allowed for the simultaneous color comparison of two liquids. Duboscq described an improved version to the French Academy of Sciences in 1868, noting that it was suitable for the analysis of colored materials for commercial purposes. That instrument had two glass tubes, one for a standard solution and the other for the sample to be analyzed. Light was reflected by a mirror at the bottom up through the tubes, refracted by a set of prisms, and viewed through an eyepiece. Identical glass plungers in each tube allowed the operator to adjust the height of the column of the liquids until the intensities appeared the same.
- The Duboscq colorimeter became much more important after Duboscq's death in 1886 than it ever was during his lifetime, especially among biochemists who found that, in conjunction with suitable reagents, it offered an efficient and effective technique for identifying foreign substances in bodily fluids. Several French and German firms were making Duboscq and modified Duboscq colorimeters by the early years of the 20th century and Americans followed suit when World War I limited the supply of European goods coming into the United States.
- Bausch & Lomb's first Duboscq colorimeter, introduced in 1920, followed the French optical design but the mechanical elements were changed: the base and frame were made of heavy castings; the rack and pinion were so arranged that the operating heads were always in a fixed position; the cups were made of ground glass cylinders and plates and encased in heavy metal; and there were adjustable verniers.
- Bausch & Lomb later described their colorimeters as "instruments of precision, which will meet the most exacting requirements of the analyst" and noted that they would serve "where speed and accuracy are essential."
- This example is marked "BAUSCH & LOMB OPTICAL CO. ROCHESTER, N.Y. U.S.A. NO. 4860." It is of the 50 mm size (that is, the glass tubes are 50 mm high), and may date from the 1930s. The National Bureau of Standards transferred it to the Smithsonian in 1965.
- Ref: D. J. Warner, "The Duboscq Colorimeter," Bulletin of the Scientific Instrument Society 88 (2006): 68-70.
- John T. Stock, "The Duboscq Colorimeter and its Inventor,"
71 (1994): 967-970.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- maker
- Bausch & Lomb Optical Company
- ID Number
- CH*326630
- catalog number
- 326630
- accession number
- 261654
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Stammer Colorimeter
- Description
- Karl Stammer, a manager of a German factory that processed beet sugar, published an account of a colorimeter for grading sugar juices in 1874. The accompanying illustration shows an example made by Franz Schmidt & Haensch, an instrument house in Berlin that had been established in 1864 and that is still in business today.
- Stammer colorimeters were imported into the United States as early as 1896. In its 1926 ad for Stammer colorimeters, the Fisher Scientific Co. in Pittsburgh noted that they cost $190 and could be used with such substances as sugar solutions, oils, shellacs, varnishes, paints, and filter press runnings.
- The Stammer colorimeter has two parallel tubes, one holding a disc of a standard color and the other holding the sample to be analyzed. Light reflected from a milk glass plate at the base passes up through the tubes, and is refracted by a set of prisms and viewed through an eyepiece. There is a plunger in the sample tube that can be moved up and down, and an identical one in the standard tube that cannot.
- This example is marked "Franz Schmidt & Haensch / Werkstätten für Wissenschaftliche Instrumente / BERLIN S. 42." The Smithsonian purchased it in 1976. A few design elements, such as the shape of the housing for the prisms, suggest that it was made in the 1920s.
- Ref: Fisher Scientific Co.,
(Pittsburgh, 1926), p. 243.
- K. Stammer, Lehrbuch der Zuckerfabrikation (Braunschweig, 1874), p. 602.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- maker
- Franz Schmidt & Haensch
- ID Number
- CH*335519
- catalog number
- 335519
- accession number
- 321714
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Peters Saccharimeter
- Description
- This half-shadow polariscope is marked "Julius Peters - Berlin NW 21" and "No. 696” and “NBS 3985." It has a Lippich polarizer, double quartz compensation, trestle stand, and thermometer. The National Bureau of Standards transferred it to the Smithsonian in 1960. The Bureau was established in 1901 and given responsibility for standardizing the saccharimeters and other apparatus that customs agents used to assess the saccharine quality of sugar coming into the United States.
- Julius Peters displayed instruments of this sort at the World’s Fair in St. Louis in 1904, and Bausch & Lomb imported them into the United States. G. W. Rolfe, an instructor in sugar analysis at M.I.T., described the special features: the mounting was designed for stability and rigidity, the wedges of the analyzer were enclosed in a dust-proof box, the pinion that moved the wedges was lengthened so that the observer could move it with his hand resting on the table, and the scales were made of an alloy named “nickelin” that was not affected by moisture and but little affected by temperature.
- Ref: German Educational Exhibition. Worlds’s Fair, St. Louis, 1904, Scientific Instruments (Berlin, 1904), pp.103-104.
- Bausch & Lomb Optical Co., Apparatus and Supplies for Chemical and Biological Laboratories (Rochester, N.Y., 1904), pp. 322-323.
- G. W. Rolfe, The Polariscope in the Chemical Laboratory (New York, 1905), pp. 36-38.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- maker
- Peters, Julius
- ID Number
- PH*318108
- catalog number
- 318108
- accession number
- 231765
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center