Making Instruments Count: Essays on Historical Scientific Instruments Presented to Gerard L'Estrange Turner

These studies in honour of Gerard Turner cover the history of old scientific instruments. Specific mechanisms described include a medieval astrolabe from Picardy, Black's chemical furnace, a sundial for the blind and astronomical clocks. Inventors, writers and innovators are also covered. Contents: Electricity from Steam: Armstrong's Hydroelectric Machine in the 1840's / Willem Hackmann -- The Pendulum as the British Length Standard: A Nineteenth-Century Legal Aberration / A. D. C. Simpson -- 'A Very Artificial Workman': The Altitude Sundials of Humphrey Cole / Denys Vaughan -- An Equinoctial Ring Dial by Ralph Greatorex / A. V. Simcock -- Francis Hall's Sundial for the Blind / Jan de Graeve -- Early Navigational Instruments in Scotland: Icons and Survivals / A. D. Morrison-Low -- Equipping the Radcliffe Observatory: Thomas Hornsby and his Instrument-Makers / J. A. Bennett -- William Prout and the Urinometer: Some Interpretations / John Burnett -- Brittle Glass: A Fragile Chapter in the History of Experimental Physics / Peter de Clercq -- Frederik Kaiser and his 'Steady Boat Compass with Nightly Illumination' / Elly Dekker -- Elisa van der Ven and the Physical Laboratory of the Teyler Foundation (Haarlem), 1878-1909 / Marijn van Hoorn. A Tale of Two Instruments / Roderick Webster and Marjorie Webster -- Seventeenth-Century Simple Microscopes / Brian Bracegirdle -- The True Name of Selligue / Margarida Archinard -- Utrecht University and its Microscopes / J. C. Deiman -- The Spectaclemakers' Company and the Origins of the Optical Instrument-Making Trade in London / Gloria C. Clifton -- A 1701 Dictionary of Mathematical Instruments / D. J. Bryden -- Illustrations of Scientific Instruments in the Gentleman's Magazine, 1746-1796 / Peter Delehar -- Some Notes on Benjamin Ayres / J. H. Leopold -- Jeppe Smith (1759-1821): A Danish Instrument-Maker / Hemming Andersen -- Scientific Instruments and Industrial Innovation: The Achievement of Jesse Ramsden / Allan Chapman -- Thomas Cooke's Order Book: Analysis of an Optical Business, 1856-1868 / Anita McConnell -- The Irish National Inventory and One of its 'Discoveries' / Charles Mollan -- The Astronomical Clocks of Andreas Hohwu: A Checklist / Willem F. J. Morzer Bruyns.