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Your search found 16 records from all Smithsonian Institution collections.
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- Description
- The astrolabe is an astronomical calculating device used from ancient times into the eighteenth century. Measuring the height of a star using the back of the instrument, and knowing the latitude, one could find the time of night and the position of other stars. The openwork piece on the front, called the rete, is a star map of the northern sky. Pointers on the rete correspond to stars; the outermost circle is the Tropic of Capricorn, and the circle that is off-center represents the zodiac, the apparent annual motion of the sun. Engraved plates that fit below the rete have scales of altitude and azimuth (arc of the horizon) for specific latitudes. This brass astrolabe has four plates; one may well be a replacement. It was made in Nuremberg by Georg Hartman in 1537. An inscription on the inside of the instrument states that it once belonged to the Italian mathematician and astronomer Galileo Galilei (1564-1642).
- Reference:
- For a detailed description of this object, see Sharon Gibbs with George Saliba, Planispheric Astrolabes from the National Museum of American History, Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1984, pp. 146-150. The object is referred to in the catalog as CCA No. 262.
- Date made
- 1537
- possible owner
- Galilei, Galileo
- maker
- Hartman, Georg
- ID Number
- MA.336117
- catalog number
- 336117
- accession number
- 215454
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- Description (Brief)
- Telegraph keys are electrical on-off switches used to send messages in Morse code. The message travels as a series of electrical pulses through a wire. The operator pushes the key’s lever down briefly to make a short signal, a dot, or holds the lever down for a moment to make a slightly longer signal, a dash. The sequence of dots and dashes represent letters and numbers. This key is an example of the earliest type of key used by Samuel Morse and Alfred Vail.
- date made
- 1843
- ID Number
- EM.181410
- catalog number
- 181410
- accession number
- 31652
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- Description
- This dark green glass matrass (or bolt head) belonged to Joseph Priestley (1733-1804), the accomplished and controversial English chemist and natural philosopher, and was undoubtedly made after his immigration to the United States in 1794. It might have been used for distillation.
- Date made
- 18th century
- date made
- 1790s
- used by
- Priestley, Joseph
- ID Number
- CH.315355.19
- accession number
- 13305
- catalog number
- 315355.19
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- Description
- Barbara McClintock (1902-1992) used this microscope in the 1940s and 1950s for research on transposing genetic elements or “jumping genes” in maize. In this process, segments of DNA jump from one location on a chromosome to another. When Dr. McClintock published her results, she met with skepticism from many fellow geneticists. However, in 1983 she was awarded the Nobel Prize for her work. It was eventually determined that these elements are found in virtually all living organisms.
- This instrument, made by Bausch & Lomb Optical Co., is fitted with a circular mechanical revolving stage designed specifically for photomicrography. Dr. McClintock gave the microscope, and its set of apochromatic lenses, to Dr. Joseph C. Gall of the Carnegie Institution in Washington, D.C. in the summer of 1977. She told him she no longer needed it and wanted it to be in safe hands. In 1993 the Carnegie Institution donated the instrument to the Smithsonian Institution.
- date made
- ca 1940
- maker
- Bausch & Lomb
- ID Number
- 1993.0115.01.1
- catalog number
- 1993.0115.01.1
- accession number
- 1993.0115
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- ID Number
- 2021.0170.01
- accession number
- 2021.0170
- catalog number
- 2021.0170.01
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- Description (Brief)
- Lightning rod, cast copper lightning rod point, having round shank with 5 tines. The stub of a steel connector emerges from the base. Shows traces of having been gilded. Irregular shape may be due to having been struck by lightning although there is no obvious sign of melting or burn marks. No information about the rod was received at the time of donation.
- ID Number
- EM.309801
- catalog number
- 309801
- accession number
- 109224
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- Description
- Around 1820 Thomas Jefferson cut and pasted verses from the New Testament to create this work, The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth, Extracted textually from the Gospels in Greek, Latin, French, & English. His purpose was to distill Jesus' ethical teachings from accounts of miracles and other elements that he considered distortions of Jesus' history and thought. Jefferson was a Deisthe believed in a Creator but did not believe in the divinity of Jesus. He thought he could distinguish between Jesus' true message and the apostles' later additions or misunderstandings by using reason as a guide.
- Jefferson created this book for his own reading and reflection. He used texts in four different languages and placed them side-by-side so that he could compare which version seemed to him to express Jesus's moral views most clearly. He believed that those views provided "the most sublime and benevolent code of morals which has ever been offered to man."
- Jefferson made no plans to publish this work. He knew that his beliefs were unorthodox and that they offended both religious authorities and political opponents. He considered his own and others' religious beliefs to be a matter of private conscience and thought they should not be subjected to public scrutiny or governmental regulation. "I not only write nothing on religion, but rarely permit myself to speak on it," he told a friend.
- The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth descended in Jefferson's family until late in the 19th century, when it came to the National Museum. The U.S. Congress first provided for the publication of the book in 1904. Since then, many editions have appeared in print. Some of them carry a title that Jefferson himself never used: "The Jefferson Bible"
- Date made
- ca 1820
- owner
- Jefferson, Thomas
- maker
- Jefferson, Thomas
- ID Number
- PL.158231
- catalog number
- 158231
- accession number
- 147182
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- Description
- A poster used at a rally at the Supreme Court for Sebelius v Hobby Lobby Stores on June 30, 2014.
- date made
- 2014
- used date
- June 30, 2014
- Associated Name
- Supreme Court of the United States
- ID Number
- 2014.0174.03
- accession number
- 2014.0174
- catalog number
- 2014.0174.03
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- Description
- Emil Klinger and The Happy Rangers. side 1: Oh My Oh Kiss Me; side 2: They'll Never Make a Monkey Out of Me (Schlegel's Recording Company ES-109/110).78 rpm.
- ID Number
- 1996.0320.19339
- catalog number
- 1996.0320.19339
- label number
- ES-109/110
- accession number
- 1996.0320
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- Date made
- 1980
- maker
- Todd, David
- ID Number
- 1982.0009.07
- accession number
- 1982.0009
- catalog number
- 1982.0009.07
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- Date made
- ca. 1890-96
- date made
- ca 1894
- maker
- Samson Electric Company
- ID Number
- 1993.0192.01
- catalog number
- 1993.0192.01
- accession number
- 1993.0192
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- Description
- Like many instruments of the sort made in London, this American one could be used as an orrery (Sun and planets out to Saturn) or a tellurian (Sun, Earth and Moon), with the mechanisms moved by a crank with an ivory handle. Four elegant brass legs support a mahogany horizon circle. The printed paper label covering this circle is marked “MADE-BY / Aaron Willard Jr. / BOSTON.” There is one brass Sun that can be used with either form. The planets are ivory. The plate of the tellurian mechanism is marked “A. WILLARD JR. BOSTON.”
- Aaron Willard Jr. (1783-1864) was a productive and prosperous clockmaker in Boston who apprenticed with his father and took over the business in 1823. He probably made this instrument in collaboration with John Locke (1792-1856), a graduate of the Yale Medical School who settled in Cincinnati. Locke also established a school for young ladies, developed an electro-chronograph for the U.S. Naval Observatory, and made important contributions to American geology.
- Ref: William Ball Jr., “Another American Orrery,” Antiques 4 (October 1938): 184-185.
- “Willard’s Portable Orrery,” The Weekly Recorder (Jan. 17, 1821): 166, from Boston Centinel.
- date made
- ca 1820
- maker
- Willard, Jr., Aaron
- ID Number
- 1986.0466.01
- catalog number
- 86.466.1
- accession number
- 1986.0466
- catalog number
- 1986.0466.01
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- ID Number
- 2021.0087.03
- accession number
- 2021.0087
- catalog number
- 2021.0087.03
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- Description
- This object, the focusing assembly from the second maser, was made at Columbia University in 1954 by a team led by physicist Charles H. Townes. Maser stands for Microwave Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation. Masers operate on the same principals as lasers, but they amplify microwaves instead of light. In fact, masers came first. Microwaves have lower energy levels than light and so were easier to produce, although the maser was not a simple invention.
- After working on microwave radar and other devices during the Second World War, Townes undertook investigations of microwave spectroscopy at Columbia University. Working with James Gordon and Herbert Zeigler, he successfully demonstrated an ammonia-beam maser in April 1954. The unit was quite large so Townes developed a smaller unit later that year, several pieces of which were donated to the Smithsonian in 1965.
- date made
- 1954
- associated date
- 1953
- maker
- Townes, Charles H.
- ID Number
- EM.323893
- catalog number
- 323893
- accession number
- 260038
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- Description
- Harriet Powers, an African American farm woman of Clarke County, Georgia, made this quilt in about 1886. She exhibited it at the Athens Cotton Fair of 1886 where it captured the imagination of Jennie Smith, a young internationally-trained local artist. Of her discovery, Jennie later wrote: "I have spent my whole life in the South, and am perfectly familiar with thirty patterns of quilts, but I had never seen an original design, and never a living creature portrayed in patchwork, until the year 1886, when there was held in Athens, Georgia, a 'Cotton-Fair,' which was on a much larger scale than an ordinary county fair, as there was a 'Wild West' show, and Cotton Weddings; and a circus, all at the same time. There was a large accumulation farm productsthe largest potatoes, tallest cotton stalk, biggest water-melon! Best display of pickles and preserves made by exhibitor! Best display of seeds &c and all the attractions usual to such occasions, and in one corner there hung a quilt-which 'captured my eye' and after much difficulty I found the owner, a negro woman, who lives in the country on a little farm whereon she and husband make a respectable living . . . . The scenes on the quilt were biblical and I was fascinated. I offered to buy it, but it was not for sale at any price."
- Four years later, Mrs. Powers, at the urging of her husband because of hard times, offered to sell the quilt, but Miss Smith's "financial affairs were at a low ebb and I could not purchase." Later Jennie sent word that she would buy the quilt if Harriet still wanted to dispose of it. Harriet "arrived one afternoon in front of my door in an ox-cart with the precious burden in her lap encased in a clean flour sack, which was still further enveloped in a crocus sack. She offered it for ten dollarsbutI only had five to give." Harriet went out to consult her husband and reported that he said she had better take the five dollars.
- Mrs. Powers regretfully turned over her precious creation, but only after explaining each of the eleven panels of the design, which Jennie Smith recorded. Briefly, the subjects are Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, a continuance of Paradise with Eve and a son, Satan amidst the seven stars, Cain killing his brother Abel, Cain goes into the land of Nod to get a wife, Jacob's dream, the baptism of Christ, the crucifixion, Judas Iscariot and the thirty pieces of silver, the Last Supper, and the Holy Family.
- In her narrative about the quilt, artist Jennie revealed why she was so taken with it: "Her style is bold and rather on the impressionists order while there is a naievete of expression that is delicious." In recent times, historians have compared Harriet's work to textiles of Dahomey, West Africa.
- The Bible quilt is both hand- and machine-stitched. There is outline quilting around the motifs and random intersecting straight lines in open spaces. A one-inch border of straight-grain printed cotton is folded over the edges and machine-stitched through all layers.
- Harriet Powers was born a slave near Athens, Georgia, on October 29, 1837. At a young age, she married Armstead Powers and they had at least nine children. Some time after the Civil War, they became landowners. Eventually, circumstances forced them to sell off part of the land but not their home. The date of Harriet's death, Jan. 1, 1910, was recently discovered on her gravestone in Athen's Gospel Pilgrim Cemetery.
- date made
- 1885-1886
- quilter
- Powers, Harriet
- ID Number
- TE.T14713
- catalog number
- T14713
- accession number
- 283472
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- Description (Brief)
- Spratt lightning rod point, 1850, marked: "J Spratt / Platinum Silver / Patent Jan 8, 1850". The marking refers to US Patent 7008, "Improvements in Alloys for Points of Lightning-Rods," issued to James Spratt of Cincinnati, 8 January 1850. Spratt described an metal alloy to be used "for the manufacture of spears and the points of lightning conductors." Spratt also patented an "Improvement in Attachments for Lightning-Conductors," US 7076, 5 February 1850.
- Date made
- 1850
- associated person
- Spratt, J.
- maker
- Spratt, J.
- ID Number
- EM.326300
- catalog number
- 326300
- accession number
- 259737
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