Small brass reflector mounted on a simple pillar that is attached to a wooden box. There is a short focusing rod and two open sights for sighting distant objects. The aperture is 2 inches, the tube is 9.5 inches long, and the focus is 7 inches. The “JAMES SHORT LONDON J744 37/405 = 7” inscription on the eye-plate indicates that this telescope was made in 1744, it has a 7-inch focus, it was Short’s 405th telescope overall, and it was his 37th telescope of this size. It came to the Museum from the Burndy Library, through Bern Dibner.
James Short (1710-1768) began making reflecting telescopes while studying at the University of Edinburgh. He was elected F.R.S. in 1836, moved to London in 1738, and made some 1360 telescopes overall. In addition to his skill at figuring and polishing mirrors, his commercial success came from his use of the division of labor (he concentrated on the mirrors and bought the brass parts from others), a growing demand for telescopes, and the support of patrons.
Ref: D. J. Bryden, James Short and His Telescopes (Edinburgh, 1968).
Gerard L’E Turner, “James Short, F.R.S., and his Contribution to the Construction of Reflecting Telescopes,” Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London 24 (1969): 91-108.
A comet seeker is a refracting telescope with a relatively short focal length and a relatively wide field of view. This example was installed at the U.S. Naval Observatory in Washington, D.C., around 1843, and came to the Smithsonian in 1966. New it cost $320. It has an achromatic objective of 3.9 inches aperture. The tube is wood with brass fittings, and measures 38 inches long. The inscription reads “Utzschneider und Fraunhofer / in München / ausgeführt von Merz u. Mahler.”
Joseph Fraunhofer was a German optician who worked in partnership with Joseph Utzschneider from 1815 until his death in 1826. Thirteen years later, this optical firm was sold to Merz u. Mahler, an instrument firm in Munich that specialized in astronomical instruments, and that remained in business, as such, until 1845.
Ref: Myles Jackson, Spectrum of Belief. Joseph von Fraunhofer and the Craft of Precision Optics (Cambridge, Mass., 2000).
Steven Dick, Sky with Ocean Joined. The U.S. Naval Observatory, 1830-2000 (Cambridge and New York, 2003), pp. 64-67.
This refracting telescope may be home-made. One inscription on the cardboard tube reads “TRIUNE TELESCOPE / Alpha has a magnifying power of 13 times and a / Field diameter of 132 feet to the mile (about) / Beta has a Magnifying Power 24 diameters, / Field – About 840 feet to the Mile. / Gamma has a magnifying power of 36 times and a / Field diameter of 66 . . .” Another reads “M. J. Kenny / Inventor & Builder / Buffalo, N.Y. / B.S.H.” Kenny has not been identified. B.S.H. may refer to the Buffalo State Hospital.
This telescope has a brass pillar-and-stand, and an achromatic objective of 43 mm. (about 1.7 inches) aperture. The tube is 1.27 m. (about 50 inches) long and covered with mahogany. The inscription on the first draw tube reads “Plőssl in Wien.” The telescope fits into a wooden box.
Georg Simon Plőssl (1794-1868) was an optician in Vienna who is perhaps best known for the eponymous eyepiece favored by many amateur astronomers.
Refracting telescope with an 8¼ inch achromatic objective, and a 61-inch wooden tube with brass fittings, and a “H. Fitz / NEW YORK” inscription on the tail piece. Henry Fitz, Jr. (1808-1863) was America’s first successful commercial telescope maker. The form, with a short focal length compared with its aperture, was termed a comet seeker.
This comet seeker is one of the “two forty-five inch Refractors” mentioned in a Georgetown publication of 1852. The achromatic objective has an aperture of 3.5 inches, and the brass tube is but 34 inches long, giving it a relatively short-focus and wide field of view. It has a brass pillar-and-tripod base, and wooden rods for adjustment in altitude and azimuth. It may have come from the shop of W. & S. Jones, a London firm that, from 1791 to 1859, sold a wide range of scientific and mathematical instruments.
Ref: Annals of the Astronomical Observatory of Georgetown College, D.C. 1 (1852), p. 14.
This telescope was probably made around 1900, and It probably belonged to Llewellyn N. Edwards (1874-1952), a structural engineer. It has an achromatic objective, and a tapered four-draw brass body covered with leather. Its four-element pancratic eye piece produces erect images with magnifications of 25, 30, 35 or 40 times. The inscription reads "BROADHURST. CLARKSON & CO / 63 FARRINGDON ROAD / LONDON, E.C."
This is one of the “two forty-five inch Refractors” mentioned in a Georgetown publication of 1852. It has a brass pillar-and-tripod base, an equatorial mount, and mahogany handles for adjustments in right ascension and declination. The (missing) achromatic objective had an aperture an 3.5 inches. The brass tube is 42½ inches long. The “W. & S. Jones” inscription refers to a London firm that, from 1791 to 1859, sold a wide range of scientific and mathematical instruments.
Ref: Annals of the Astronomical Observatory of Georgetown College, D.C. 1 (1852), p. 14.
H. Page Bailey was a dentist in Riverside, California, who became interested in telescope making when a cash-strapped patient paid his bill with a 12-inch telescope. In 1932, Bailey attended a meeting of the Riverside Astronomical Society at which D.O. Hendrix, an astronomer at the Mount Wilson Observatory, discussed Bernhard Schmidt’s recently-published paper on photographic telescopes. That talk inspired Bailey to build this f/2.5 instrument. It is the first Schmidt telescope made in the United States, and the first one made by anyone else other than Bernhard Schmidt himself. The mount is made from an automobile frame.
The American military began using telescopes with stable mounts and tubes of fixed length in the 1890s, to supplement the spyglasses it had used since the Revolution and the field glasses (binoculars) it had used since the Civil War. This example is of that sort. It has an achromatic objective of 110 mm (about 4¼ inches) aperture, a turret with three terrestrial eyepieces, a sunshade, an alt-azimuth mount, and a wooden tripod. The tube is 51 inches long. The “Zeiss” signature refers to the important German optical firm that began in business in Jena in 1846. The “6366” on the prism housing, if it is a serial number, suggests a date of manufacture in the 1890s. The eyepiece turret is marked: “Orthoskop. Okular f = 40”.”
This instrument came to the Smithsonian from the U.S. Weather Bureau which had installed it on Tatoosh Island, off the Olympic Peninsula in Washington State, and used it for spotting ships at sea. It may earlier have been used by the Army Corps of Engineers.
Ref: D. J. Warner, “Optical Elements of Fire Control, 1890-1921,” Rittenhouse 18 (2004): 21-59.
Vassar College was established as a school for women at Poughkeepsie, N.Y., in 1861. Like many other American colleges of the period, it had a well-equipped astronomical observatory. Its primary telescope, an equatorial refractor of 12½ inches aperture, was made by Henry Fitz, Jr., America’s first successful commercial telescope maker. Its first professor of astronomy was Maria Mitchell, America’s first woman astronomer and first woman scientist of note. In the mid-1860s, Mitchell asked Alvan Clark to rework the large objective lens and also the drive mechanism. Warner & Swasey built a new mount in the 1880s. Vassar donated this historic telescope to the Smithsonian in 1963.
Ref: Deborah Warner and Robert Ariail, Alvan Clark & Sons. Artists in Optics (Richmond, 1995), pp. 170-173.
Brass telescope with a pillar-and-tripod stand, an achromatic objective of 2⅞ inches aperture, an eyepiece, and holders for a telescoping brace (no longer extant). The tube is 45 inches long. The inscription on the faceplate at the eye end reads “TROUGHTON & SIMMS / LONDON.” The firm of Troughton & Simms began trading as such in 1824. It became Troughton & Simms, Ltd., in 1916, and Cooke, Troughton & Simms, Ltd., in 1922.
The University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa built an astronomical observatory in 1843-1844 and probably acquired this telescope at that time. The school did not admit women until the 1890s.
Ref: Anita McConnell, Instrument Makers to the World. A History of Cooke, Troughton & Simms (York, 1992).
The introduction of silvered-glass mirrors—easier to figure and more durable than solid metal ones—made reflecting telescopes popular, especially with amateur astronomers.
This example is marked "John Browing London." It has a simple alt-azimuth mount. The aperture is 4.25 inches; the tube is 38.5 inches long.
John Browning was a young instrument maker when he issued A Plea for Reflectors, Being a Description of the New Astronomical Telescopes with Silvered-Glass Specula (London, 1867). He offered telescopes with mirrors made by the retired schoolteacher, George Henry With.
Refracting telescope with a 4-inch achromatic objective, several eyepieces, and wooden tripod. The brass tube, 63 inches long, is inscribed “Dollond London.” A paper label in the wooden box holding the telescope reads “G. Dollond / Optical, Mathematical, and / Philosophical Instrument Maker / to Her Majesty / 50 St. Paul’s Churchyard, London.”
The Dollond family began in business as opticians in London in 1750. George Dollond took responsibility for the firm around 1820 and shortened the signature to Dollond.
This telescope belonged to, and was given in memory of, Charles C. Carey (1903-1963), President of the General Radio Company (1956-1963).
Ref: Gloria Clifton, “Dollond Family,” in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
This Cassegrain reflecting telescope was probably made in the 18th century and used by an amateur astronomer. It has a metal primary mirror of 4 inches aperture, a brass tube covered with fish skin, an alt-azimuth mount, and a pillar-and-claw stand that could rest on a table top.
Brass refracting telescope from the shop of Henry Fitz, Jr. (1808-1863), America’s first successful commercial telescope maker. The aperture is 2-inches; the length overall is 26 inches.
This brass telescope sits on a pillar-and-tripod stand. The achromatic objective is 2.75 inches aperture and 57-inch focus. The “W. & S. Jones” inscription is that of William and Samuel Jones, brothers who, beginning in 1791, sold a range of scientific and mathematical instruments from their shops on Holborn Hill in London.
The telescope was owned and used by Andrew Ellicott (1754-1820), an American surveyor and geodesist who determined longitudes by observing eclipses of the moons of Jupiter.
Ref: Andrew Ellicott, “Astronomical, and Thermometrical Observations, made on the Boundary between the United States and His Catholic Majesty,” Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 5 (1802): 203-311; also Ellicott, “Astronomical observations made at Lancaster, Pennsylvania, chiefly with a view to ascertain the longitude of that borough, and as a test of the accuracy with which the longitude made by found by lunar observation,” pp. 61-69.
Gloria Clifton, Directory of British Scientific Instrument Makers 1550-1851 (London, 1995), p. 155.
A telescope on an equatorial mount allows an astronomer to follow a star as it moves across the sky (or, rather, as the earth rotates below it). Several British and European forms were introduced in the latter decades of the 18th century. This one was designed and made by Jesse Ramsden.
Ramsden’s Universal Equatorial instruments were expensive, and appreciated by people of means, We do not know who owned this example originally. But we do know that Thomas Jefferson had an instrument of this sort.
The telescope is 16.25 inches long. The achromatic objective has an aperture of 2.5 inches. The eyepiece is missing. There is a graduated circle for right ascension and another for declination, as well as a mechanism for adjusting the instrument for use at any latitude. The horizontal limb is marked “Ramsden London.”
Ref: Description of a New Universal Equatoreal, Made by Mr. J. Ramsden, with the Method of Adjusting in for Observation (London, 1773).
Description of the Universal Equatoreal, and of the New Refraction Apparatus, Much Improved by Mr. Ramsden (London, 1791).
This achromatic refracting telescope, with mount designed to be hung on a wall, was made by Robert- Aglaé Cauchoix (1776-1845), an innovative French optician who, in 1814, opened a shop for optical and physical Instruments on Quai de Voltaire, near the Pont Royal, in Paris.
Ref: Description des Lunettes Murales, construites par M. Cauchoix, Optician, Quai Voltaire à Paris. Avec l'indication des procedes pour s'en servir, et des examples des calculs d'Observations (Paris, 1818).