This equatorially mounted telescope, made in Paris around 1860, has a 4-inch aperture silvered-glass primary mirror of the sort proposed by the physicist J. B. L. Foucault. A small printed label on the square wooden tube carries the message “Les Télescopes à mirroir de verre qui se vendent dans la maison SECRETAN portent tous la signature ci-dessous” along with Foucault’s signature. A one-page lithographed “Instruction pour les Télescopes de verre argenté” carries the stamp of Lerebours et Secretan.
Marc François Louis Secretan was a scientific instrument maker in Paris who worked in partnership with, and then succeeded, Noel-Lean Lerebours.
"Telescope en verre argente," L'Annee Scientifique et Industrielle 2 (1857): 25-29.
"Le telescope de M. Foucault," L'Annee Scientifique et Industrielle 7 (1862): 28-31.
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