Joseph 

AND HIS CONTRIBUTIONS 

TO THE MEDAL RULING 

AND PHOTOGRAPHIC ARTS 

Arthur H. Fra^ier 

Noviol9?5 

SMITHSONIA N STUDIES IN HISTOR Y 

AND TECHNOLOG Y J*r^ NUMBER 32 

^mitnsonian Ii;i^titution T^tess 

City of Washington 

1975 
ABSTRAC T 

Frazier, Arthur H. Joseph Saxton and His Contributions to the Medal Ruling 

and Photographic Arts. Smithsonian Studies in History and Technology, number 

32, 17 pages, 13 figures, 1975.—Medal ruling is a little known art by which pictures 

are mechanically produced from coins, medals, cameos, and other objects presented 

in relief. It made a sudden and spectacular appearance very early in the 19th century, 

but with the advent of daguerreotype photography near the middle of that century, 

it disappeared almost as suddenly. Joseph Saxton (1799-1873), an extraordinary 

mechanician was caught up in those arts, and made exceptional contributions to 

both of them. His medal ruling machines were the first of their kind to have eliminated 

distortions from the resulting pictures. Among the scientific uses to which his final 

model was applied was a diffraction grating made for John William Draper, who 

took the first photograph ever executed of the diffraction spectrum. The only remaining model of the three machines Saxton is known to have built is now at the 

National Museum of History and Technology, Smithsonian Institution. 

The daguerreotype Saxton took of Philadelphia's first Central High School 

and the State Armory is perhaps the earliest daguerreotype ever taken in the United 

States, and certainly represents the oldest American daguerreotype extant. It is 

now in the custody of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. A 

combination of Saxton's medal ruling and daguerreotype skills helped to produce 

a remarkable illustration of the second United States Mint, which was published in 

1842 in Eckfeldt and Du Bois' Manual of Gold and Silver Coins, and which has been 

republished in this present study. 

OFFICIAL PUBLICATION DATE is handstamped in a limited number of initial copies and is recorded 

in the Institution's annual report, Smithsonian Tear. SI PRESS NUMBER 5365. COVER DESIGN: Medal 

ruling of "Alexander, Emperor of all the Russias, in the costume of the Russian hero, Radomisl, of 

the 9th century." Apparently this medallic ruling was made from a medal identical to the one from 

which Christian Gobrecht, executed the first American-made medal ruling in 1817. See page 2. 

(Courtesy Library of Congress) 

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data 

Frazier, Arthur H. 

Joseph Saxton and his contributions to the medal ruling and photographic arts 

(Smithsonian studies in history and technology, no. 32) 

Includes index. 

Supt. of Docs, no.: SI 1.28:32 

1. Saxton, Joseph, 1799-1873. 2. Drawing. 3. Daguerreotype. 4. Numismatics. I. Title. 

II. Series: Smithsonian Institution. Smithsonian studies in history and technology, no. 32. 

T40.S3F7 760'.2 75-619021 

For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office 

Washington, D.C. 20402 - Price 85 cents 

Stock Number 047-001-00123-1 
Contents 

Page 

Prologue . . ... . . . 1 

Correction of Distortion Effects 2 

The Saxton-Bate Controversy . 3 

Saxton's Return to America .. . . . . . 6 

Restudy of Distortion Effects ... . .. . 7 

Comparison of the Saxton and Bate Machines ... . 8 

Advent of the Daguerreotype . , . . .. . 9 

Refutation of Moser's Photographic Theory . . . . 12 

The "U.S . Mint " 13 

America's First Diffraction Grating . . . . 15 

Epilogue . , .. . 15 

Notes . 16 

Index . . . . . . 17 

III 
Joseph Saxton 

AND HIS CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE 

MEDAL RULING AND PHOTOGRAPHIC ARTS 

Arthur H. Fra'^ier 

Prologue 

"Mr. Saxton is unquestionably one of the most 

Skilful and scientific mechanicians that our country 

has produced." That was the expression used by 

Dr. Robert M. Patterson, the sixth Director of the 

United States Mint in Philadelphia, and Isaiah 

Lukens, Vice President and charter member of the 

Franklin Institute, v^^hen they nominated Joseph 

Saxton (1799-1873) for membership in the American 

Philosophical Society.^ Several years after having 

been elected into the Society, Saxton w^as selected as 

one of the original fifty members of the National 

Academy of Sciences. For the last thirty years of his 

life, he was in charge of the Olhce of Weights and 

Measures in the United States Coast Survey, the 

forerunner of the National Bureau of Standards. 

During the course of those events, he designed and 

built many remarkable machines and instruments. 

This story is concerned with his instruments for 

making medal rulings, one of which is shown in 

Figure 1, and with the camera with which he took, 

in 1839, America's oldest and most famous 

daguerreotype.^ 

When he was eighteen years old, Saxton was serving 

an apprenticeship under David Newingham, a local 

silversmith, watchmaker, and engraver, in his native 

village of Huntingdon, Pennsylvania. Newingham died 

Arthur H. Frazier, 3636 Sixteenth Street, N.W., Washington, D.C. 

20010. Honorary Research Associate, Smithsonian Institution. 

the following year, however, and young Saxton, 

armed with a letter of recommendation from his 

neighbor John McCahan, publisher of the Huntingdon 

Gazette, saying that he was a lad of good character 

and very ingenious, journeyed to Philadelphia.^ 

There he became acquainted with Christian Gobrecht, 

also an engraver and the first American to have built 

(in 1817) a medal ruling machine. 

Ruling machines belong to a family of mechanized 

engraving devices, a few members of which are still 

used for decorating, with scrollwork designs, the 

margins of bank notes, bonds, and other financial and 

legal documents. Medal-rxxWn^ machines differ from 

other instruments of the genre in that they produce 

from a coin, medal, or from any model carved in 

relief, a drawing or an engraving that, upon being 

printed, resembles a photograph of it. The fact that 

such machines were capable of producing excellent 

pictures well before the advent of the daguerreotype, 

or any other photographic process, makes their 

invention a remarkable achievement. 

Although Gobrecht was the first American to have 

constructed such a machine, the process had been 

known previously in France and England. An 1832 

issue of the Mechanics^ Magazine of London, for example, contains a translation from the Manuel du 

Tourneur (1816) in which an apparatus is described 

for producing copper engravings from medals and 

other objects in relief.* A drawing of the machine, 

based on that translation, appears in Figure 2. 

No evidence has been found to indicate that 
SMITHSONIAN STUDIES IN HISTORY AND TECHNOLOGY 

FIGURE 1.-Saxton's medal ruling machine (circa 1837) at the Smithsonian Institution on loan 

from the Franklin Institute. (Photograph by the author) 

Gobrecht could have known about this European 

machine. As a matter of fact, his design differed 

greatly from it. Regretfully, the only thing that 

Gobrecht's and all other early models had in common 

was a fault—the images they produced were so 

badly distorted that they never received universal 

approval. 

Joseph Saxton was still the 18-year-old apprentice 

in Huntingdon when Gobrecht exhibited the first 

engraving he had made with his invention—a likeness 

of the head of Alexander I, Czar of Russia (see 

cover). Since engravers of the old school were quick 

to call attention to its distortions, it seems possible 

that Saxton had learned of that fault even before 

the two met in Philadelphia. 

Correction of Distortion Effects 

All mechanical devices were fascinating to Saxton, 

so it is not surprising that soon after they became 

acquainted, Saxton built a machine for himself similar 

to Gobrecht's. From then on, he gave much thought 

to eliminating the distortion in the images it produced, 

but it was to take more than ten years and a trip to 

England before he managed to do so. As shown in 

Figure 3a, the arms which held the tracing pointers 

on both Gobrecht's and Saxton's first machines, were 

positioned horizontally. In August 1829, just a short 

time after Saxton arrived in London, he drew a 

sketch (now in the Archives of the Smithsonian Institution) showing how the problem had been solved. A 
NUMBER 3 2 

9 -3 

,MEDAL Y HANDLE 

TRACING - ENGRAVING 

BAR-

/ 

ENGRAVING NEEDLE 

COPPER PLATE 

FIGURE 2.—Author's conception of the medal ruling machine described in the Manuel du Tourneur 

(1816). 

copy of it appears in Figure 3b. As may be seen, the 

horizontal arm has been tilted downward at an angle 

of 45 degrees. He called the altered part a "diagonal 

tracer arm." It was the only change needed to convert 

his and Gobrecht's machines from failures to successes, 

and to eliminate the growing criticism about distortion that had been directed at the new art of medal 

ruling. 

Saxton never patented his improvement and never 

received any monetary benefits commensurate with 

its importance. To be sure, he did execute a few 

engravings with his machine, but his income from 

them must have been very little. His London diaries, 

also preserved in the Smithsonian Insitution Archives, 

contain only thirteen brief references to the machine. 

Interestingly, they show that the medal he was employed to copy most frequently was that commemorating Dr. Franz Gall (1758-1828), the founder of 

the pseudoscience of phrenology. The final entry 

reveals that Saxton had been called on by Sir John 

Trevellyan and his son to see the machine for copying 

medals. Walter Trevellyan, presumably Sir John's 

son, purchased the machine from Saxton not long 

afterward. 

The Saxton-Bate Controversy 

It seems strange that Saxton made no mention in 

those diaries about the visits he had exchanged with 
SMITHSONIAN STUDIES IN HISTORY AND TECHNOLOGY 

HORIZONTAL 

TRACER ARM 

MEDAL 

COPPER 

PLATE 

DIAGONAL 

TRACER ARM 

MEDAL 

FIGURE 3.—a. Author's conception of Gobrecht's medal ruling machine (1817); b, Saxton's drawing, 

showing his "diagonal tracer" (1829). 

a Mr. Bate and his son, and how they had secretly 

applied Saxton's diagonal tracer to their own ruling 

machine and patented the idea before Saxton learned 

about their intention to do so, thus depriving Saxton 

of the benefits he might have received by taking out 

such a patent. Many of those circumstances are described in the following extracts of a letter by Saxton 

published in 1838 in Vincent Nolte's booklet Memorial 

of Facts Connected with the History of Medallic Engraving: 

No. 24 Sussex Street, 

London University 

May 6, 1837 

Sir, — 

In compliance with your request that I should state some 

facts with reference to the improvements I have made in the 

machine for copying medals by ruling, I beg to state that the 

original machine was invented so far back as 1817 by Mr. 

Christian Gobrecht, an engraver in Philadelphia who accidentally discovered that by ruling over a hammered plate, the 
NUMBER 3 2 

'hf^'mii 

• 3 •:: A K, K. y A C C 'JJ R A •";;• £ . 

••' Sf.B»>:T: , 

BE11&;- •WTT 

'Sr-rr ;,-olO'» " 

FIGURE 4.—Medal rulings executed with the Collas machine in response to a challenge from John 

Bate's supporters. (Courtesy Library of Congress) 
SMITHSONIAN STUDIES IN HISTORY AND TECHNOLOGY 

whole of the marks were correctly transferred to the copper 

plate; and hence the idea of copying a medal . . . . In 1818, I 

contrived a similar machine to that of Mr. Gobrecht, and soon 

after my arrival in this country I made an improvement in the 

machine, by which the whole or any given part of the distortion 

could be prevented ... . 

Mr. Petty Vaughan being of the opinion that I might introduce this kind of ruling with success on eye-glasses and on jewelery, gave me letters of introduction to various persons, to 

whom I shewed the specimens ruled on metal and glass, among 

others, Messrs. Rundell and Bridge, Messers. Green and Ward, 

also Mr. Bate. When I called on Mr. Bate with this introduction 

in 1829, and shewed to him the specimen ruled by my improved 

machine, he at that time had not seen any machine at all for 

this object. Although pleased with the specimens, he discouraged 

me as to introducing it profitably for the objects then proposed. 

After several unsuccessful attempts to introduce this species 

of ruling, I applied myself to other objects, and allowed the 

subject to remain dormant ... . 

In the year 1832, Mr. Gill . . informed me that Mr. Bate's 

son was taking out a patent for an improvement in the medal 

ruling machine; and very soon after, Mr. Bate and his son 

called on me, having been informed by Mr. Gill that I had 

made an improvement in the medal ruling machine, and 

stated that if it was similar to his machine, he was unwilling to 

do anything that would be injurious to my interest. I then 

shewed to them a specimen ruled on glass without distortion, 

and it was agreed that I should rule further specimens on 

copper plate, and shew it to them. A few days afterwards I 

ruled on an etching ground a head of Franklin and a head of 

Minerva. I called with this plate on Mr. Bate, and saw his 

son, who admitted that it was very well done, but he thought 

he saw a little distortion. As you are in possession of an impression taken from this plate, you can judge whether he was 

correct or not in his opinion. He expressed a wish that I should 

rule a head of Ariadne by my machine, and he would also 

rule the same head by his machine, in order that he might see 

whether my machine did really perform what I stated that it 

would do, viz. rule without any distortion. Mr. Bate promised 

to send me a cast impression in glass, in order that we might 

both rule from exactly the same original. Mr. Bate did not 

keep his promise to send the head of Ariadne as proposed. 

Soon after, I was informed . . . that Mr. Bate had abandoned 

all idea of taking out a patent; I therefore did not consider it 

necessary to take any steps to prevent the patent being taken 

out. It however, afterwards turned out that I had been deceived, as the patent was very shortly afterwards sealed ... . 

I am Sir, your obedient Servant, 

(Signed) J. Saxton 

To Vincent Nolte, Esq., Tavistock House, Tavistock Square.^ 

of Commons on a proposal to print copies of some 

3000 rulings obtained from historical medals in the 

collection of the British Museum. To disprove a 

claim by Bate's supporters that the Collas machine 

was incapable of producing an undistorted image 

of a cameo like that of the familiar Greek Goddess 

Ariadne, Nolte included in his booklet, the illustration shown on the cover and that in Figure 4. The 

lowermost ruling in Figure 4, captioned "Answer to 

Mr. Bate's Challenge," and the three uppermost 

rulings are free from any noticeable distortion, but 

Nolte went a step farther. As if to express the contempt he felt for Mr. Bate, he included six additional 

views of the Ariadne cameo which were deliberately 

distorted in such a way that they obviously " made 

faces" at his tormentor! In any event, those hearings 

produced no immediate action. 

Of somewhat more importance here are the 

statements in Saxton's letter about Bate's patent. 

British patent No. 6254, entitled "Machinery to 

Produce Imitations of Medals, Sculptures, &c." was 

awarded him on 9 October 1832. A side view of the 

machine, substantially as shown in the patent drawings, appears in Figure 5. A comparison of it with 

the machine shown in Figure 2, indicates that 

basically its design was the same as the one described 

in the Manuel du Tourneur, although Bate had added 

a diagonal tracer much like Saxton's except that it 

tilted 45 degrees upward rather than 45 degrees 

downward. 

A flurry of activity in the manufacture of medal 

ruling machines followed the granting of the Bate 

patent. Besides the one patented in France by Collas, 

a number of custom-made models which did not 

conflict with the Bate patent showed up in England, 

and others began to appear in Germany. This spurt 

of activity reached a peak in the early 1840s, but for 

reasons explained later, lost momentum during the 

next ten years. 

Saxton's Return to America 

Nolte, the recipient of the foregoing letter, was the 

principle shareholder in the firm of Lachevardiere 

and Company of Paris, a firm which had purchased 

the rights to the French patent on Achille Collas' 

medal ruling machine. His booklet was filled with 

bitter accusations against John Bate for having 

"wantonly set aside all rules of ordinary courtesy" at 

the hearings conducted by a committee of the House 

Saxton apparently paid little attention to medal 

ruling machines for several years after he sold his 

original model to Trevellyan. In 1835, his American 

friend, Franklin Peale, son of the famous artist, 

Charles Willson Peale, paid him a visit which not 

only diverted his energies to other matters, but foreshadowed his departure from London. Peale had been 

sent by the United States Mint to study the methods 
NUMBER 3 2 

COPPER PLATE 

FIGURE 5.—The Bate meda l ruling machine (1832). 

of operation at European mints, and in connection 

with that mission, placed an order with Saxton on 

21 January 1835 for a large assay balance scale. When 

it was delivered, Dr. Robert M. Patterson, the Mint's 

Director, was so pleased with it, that he promptly 

ordered five more of them, and offered Saxton "a 

good job to begin with" if he would return to Philadelphia and take charge of the balances at the Mint.^ 

The offer was accepted, and Saxton began his homeward trip during the first week in May 1837. 

Upon his arrival in Philadelphia, Saxton obtained 

room and board in what was then the 200 block of 

Walnut Street, within reasonable walking distance to 

the Mint. Among the old friends who welcomed him 

home was Christian Gobrecht, who had become the 

Mint's Assistant Chief Engraver. No doubt they again 

held long discussions about the medal ruling machine. 

Probably to demonstrate the effectiveness of the improvement he had devised, Saxton soon began building the second of his three models (Figure 1). 

Restudy of Distortion Effects 

Having been afforded an opportunity to use this 

machine, the author has executed, for comparison 

purposes, several images with it when equipped with 

its present diagonal arm, and a number of other 

images with a temporary horizontal arm like the one 

Gobrecht had originally installed on his machine. 
SMITHSONIAN STUDIES IN HISTORY AND TECHNOLOGY 

a 

FIGURE 6.—Images produced with the Saxton medal ruling machine: a, side and top views of 

pyramid-shaped model used in tests; b, image produced with a horizontal arm simulating Gobrecht's design; t, image produced with Saxton's improved diagonal tracer. 

The model used on this present occasion was a simple 

pyramid, one-half inch in height, with a base l^e 

inches square. The results appear in Figure 6. It 

shows that when the horizontal tracing arm was used 

(Figure 66), the peak of the pyramid became translated far to the left; when the diagonal tracing arm 

was used (Figure 6c), the peak appeared, as it should, 

close to the center. During this experiment it was 

found that if the angle of the arm exceeded 45 degrees, 

the peak would be translated over to the opposite 

side. It follows, then, that by properly adjusting the 

angle, the operator can completely eliminate distortion. In this connection, it may be noted that Saxton's 

machine contained no special provision for making 

fine adjustments of the angle, although his 1829 

drawing (Figure Zh) illustrates how he obviously 

intended them to be made. The drawing shows the 

medal resting upon one or more flat plates. By the 

simple expedient of increasing or decreasing the 

thickness of the stack of plates, the angle of depression 

could be varied until the desired results were produced. 

Comparison of the Saxton and Bate Machines 

A comparison of Saxton's machine with the one 

shown in Bate's patent drawing (Figure 5) indicates 

that Saxton's was superior in every respect. To work 

the Bate machine, the operator first had to bring 

the tracing carriage to the starting side of the medal. 

He then had to bring the tracing point into gentle 

contact with the medal and maintain that contact 

continuously while moving the carriage across the 

medal's entire width. After having completed the 

traverse, he had to back the engraving needle away 

from the copper plate and the tracing point away 

from the medal before returning the carriage to its 

point of beginning. For every inch of medal, those 

operations had to be repeated some two hundred 

dmes, a dring and time-consuming effort. Any muscular jerk, any failure to perform each traverse smoothly, 

or any operation performed out of proper sequence 

could spoil the engraving. Much practice and concentration would be required to produce satisfactory 

results. 

Saxton's machine was not only simpler and more 

rugged in construction, but was easier to work. After 

the medal and the copper plate had been set up, all 

the operator had to manipulate were two small 

cranks, first one and then the other, over and over 

again. The motions of the cranks were controlled 

mechanically to prevent their being turned beyond 

the proper distance. The amount of pressure applied 

against the medal and copper plate during the engraving phase of each traverse was also mechanically 

controlled; the tracing point and engraving needle 

were raised automatically during the return trip, and 

automatically lowered. Most beginners could learn 

the necessary techniques in less than two hours. After 

becoming skilled, an operator could probably execute 

any job in about one-third the time required by the 

Bate machine. As far as the final products were 

concerned, there should have been no distinguishable 

differences. 

The third medal ruling machine made by Saxton, 

in about 1840, was a power-driven model using the 

recently installed steam engine at the Mint. After 

setting up the machine and making the necessary 

adjustments, Saxton would connect it to the steam 

engine, take one last look to see that everything was 
NUMBER 3 2 

functioning properly, then go about his other duties. 

The machine would shut itself off when the job was 

finished. Joseph Henry, the first Secretary of the 

Smithsonian Institution, presented a "Biographical 

Memoir of Joseph Saxton" before the National 

Academy of Sciences in 1874, in which he devoted 

considerable attention to Saxton's medal ruling machine. His comments summarize that achievement: 

By . . changes requiring inventive powers of high order, he 

[Saxton] removed entirely the distortion and rendered the 

[Gobrecht] ruling machine capable of engraving facsimiles of 

medals, as well of high as of low relief. He subsequently rendered the apparatus entirely automatic by applying to it the 

motive power of water and steam, so that when once set in 

motion it would faithfully perform its task with unerring precision; and when the ruling was completed, it would stop on 

the instant, cutting ofT the motive power. The rapidity of the 

execution was another feature of the apparatus; one face of a 

coin, an inch in diameter, ruled with lines one two-hundredths 

of an inch apart, was completely engraved in about half an 

hour. 

Dr. Patterson was fond of exhibiting and explaining Saxton's 

ruling machine to the distinguished visitors of the Mint. It 

was, indeed, an interesting exhibition to see this machine engraving its fine lines, moving its tracer backward and forward 

without aid, or even the observation of a superintendent, and 

stopping when its task was accomplished, and, by the sound of 

a bell, calling for more work.' 

The most ambitious project undertaken with 

Saxton's steam-driven machine was the preparation 

of engravings of all the coins in the "Cabinet" of the 

Mint for publication in a book entitled A Manual of 

Gold and Silver Coins of All Nations Struck within the Past 

Century, by Jacob R. Eckfeldt and William E. Du 

Bois, two assayers at the Mint. The first edition 

(1842) of that work contains illustrations of hundreds 

of coins, all from engravings Saxton made with his 

machine.^ One page of those illustrations appears in 

Figure 7. The frontispiece of the book, showing the 

Mint itself, was also engraved with Saxton's machine. 

Before discussing it in detail, however, mention should 

be made of the advent of the daguerreotype. 

Advent of the Daguerreotype 

The daguerreotype process was described and made 

available for unrestricted world wide use at a historic meeting of the French Academy of Sciences in 

Paris on 19 August 1839. News articles about that 

event began appearing in Philadelphia between 

September and November 1839 in the United States 

Gazette, the Journal of the Franklin Institute, and the 

American Daily Advertiser. After reading one or more of 

those accounts, Saxton improvised, from a cigar box 

and an ordinary reading glass, a daguerreotype 

camera, and on 16 October 1839 took a picture with 

it from a second-story window of the Mint. It has 

been said that instead of a copper plate, he used a 

strip of polished silver such as that from which coin 

blanks were cut.® His efforts were rewarded with a 

l%x 2 ^ inch daguerreotype of the State Armory and 

the Philadelphia Central High.School, both of which 

were then located just across Juniper Street from the 

Mint. The event was reported in the 25 October 

1839 issue of the United States Gazette: 

There was on Tuesday (the 22nd) exhibited to us a photographic plate of the Central High School made by Joseph 

Saxton. It is the first attempt, and is sufficiently successful to 

demonstrate the beauty of the art when perfected; and we add 

that the success also shows the art to be quite susceptible of 

great and immediate improvement. 

Saxton's daguerreotype, one of the first ever made in 

this country and the oldest extant American-made 

picture by any photographic process, is being preserved in the Museum of the Historical Society of 

Pennsylvania. Historically, it is one of the most famous 

pictures in all of American photography (Figure 8). 

An interesting sidelight on this picture is that the 

scene it portrays is "reversed." A modern photograph 

of the two buildings, if taken from the same location, 

would show the Armory at the observer's right, and 

the school (identified by the astronomical observatory) 

at his left. On the daguerreotype, however, they appear in the opposite order. Saxton had used an ordinary reading glass for the lens of his makeshift camera, 

and the images produced with such a lens on an 

opaque surface are always reversed. Probably the 

first method attempting to correct this condition appeared in a U.S. patent entitled "For an Improved 

Apparatus for Taking Daguerreotype Likenesses," 

granted to Alexander S. Wolcott, a dentist in New 

York City, 8 May 1844. In it, a large concave mirror, 

located inside the rear end of the camera, was used 

instead of a lens. When the front of the camera was 

opened, the rays of light entering it became focused 

on a small sensitized plate situated about midway 

between the mirror and the camera's open end. This 

was the first patent on photography to have been 

awarded in the United States.^° 

A reproduction of Saxton's daguerreotype (some 

refer to it as a transcript, others as a woodcut, and 

still others as a metal engraving) made its first ap-
10 SMITHSONIAN STUDIES IN HISTORY AND TECHNOLOGY 

:"' ' > A ^'^''' . .£"':''^';i•li'''^7-'i••• ' -c" • 

/-Spa ' 

'•i^N ''l}^ 

\-^T^^ % 

^^i^ -

^''i^uwni.'-^' .J03V^^>* 

FIGURE 7.—Plate 2 from Eckfeldt and Du Bois' 1842 edition of A Manual of Gold and Silver Coins. 

(Courtesy Library of Congress) 
NUMBER 3 2 11 

a 

mtlm^ 

-'•'•"' ''^_^ 

•^^^90 

1 |Mt .ii | 

J H ^-y- "'• •• ^^' VHB * 

^ 

FIGURE 8.—a. The daguerreotype taken by Saxton 16 October 1839 (courtesy Historical Society of 

Pennsylvania); b, same scene, as published in 1864 in The Camera and the Pencil (courtesy Library of 

Congress); c-d, reversed versions of the above, with the buildings in their correct positions. 

pearance, presumably, in 1864 in a book entitled 

The Camera and the Pencil, by Marcus Aurelius Root." 

It presented a much clearer image of the school and 

the arsenal, but those buildings still remained in their 

reversed positions. Tha t same reproduction has been 

published again and again; for example, in the July 

1892 issue of the American Journal of Photography, and 

in the magazine section of the 17 November 1963 

issue of the Philadelphia Enquirer.^"^ 

Modern photography affords a simple method 

whereby such scenes can be portrayed in both their 

correct and reversed positions, so advantage has been 

taken of that method to prepare Figure 8, wherein 

the original and the later reproduction are presented 

both ways. 

None of the buildings discussed above are still 

standing, and the area has changed so much that one 

might have difficulty trying to re-establish their actual 
12 SMITHSONIAN STUDIES IN HISTORY AND TECHNOLOGY 

PENN SQ. I PENN SQ. J L 

HIGH STREET 

PENN SQ, 

OLIVE ST, 

U.S . MINT 

[ 

HIGH r r 

SCHOOL L L 

STATE 

ARSENAL 

1 I 

I I 

I I 

I I 

~ i^u-Y STREET" ' 

100 ' 

CLOVER STREET 

CHESTNUT STREET 

FIGURE 9.—Location from which Saxton took the oldest surviving American daguerreotype (see 

Figure 8). 

locations. Figure 9, based on contemporary city maps, 

shows those locations and the position of the camera 

at the time the daguerreotype was taken. It may be 

noted that the Mint was in the block now occupied 

by the Widener Building; both the Central High 

School and the State Armory were in the block now 

occupied by the John Wanamaker store; and that 

both of these blocks presently surround the southeast 

corner of Philadelphia's present City' Hall Square. 

Refutation of Moser's Photographic Theory 

Photographers of the 1840s did much speculating 

over the manner in which photographic effects were 

produced. Many false theories were expressed, and 

it is interesting to note that Saxton refuted at least 

one of them. In 1842, the German Handbuch der 

Photographic contained an article describing experiments performed by a Konigsberg scientist named 

Moser, who claimed that all objects radiated invisible photographic rays which, even in total darkness, were capable of transferring their images onto 

nearby surfaces. Dr. Paul Beck Goddard, then a 

leading daguerreotype innovator and photographer 

in Philadelphia, called the article to the attention of 

the members who attended the 30 May 1843 meeting 

of the American Philosophical Society. Aside from Dr. 

Goddard, those who entered the subsequent discussion 

were Joseph Saxton, Professor Joseph Henry, and 

Professor James Rogers. During the course of that 

discussion, an account was given of experiments 

that Saxton had performed on the subject. He claimed 
NUMBER 3 2 13 

that the transfer of images which Moser had observed 

probably resulted from the gradual evaporation of 

unnoticed oily or other organic substances on the 

surfaces of the objects under observation. Perhaps 

the most convincing experiment he had performed 

was one in which the tested objects had been cleaned 

in acid of every trace of such oily or organic substances 

before placing them close to plane surfaces. Not one 

of them so treated produced any image of itself upon 

the neighboring surface regardless of the length of 

time it was allowed to do so.^^ 

The "U.S. Mint" 

The illustration of the second United States Mint 

which Eckfeldt and Du Bois had published in their 

Manual of Gold and Silver Coins was produced from a 

photograph Saxton had taken in 1841 with his 

daguerreotype camera pointed northward from the 

south side of Chestnut Street, the street toward which 

the Mint building faced. Christian Gobrecht, who 

by then had become the Mint's Chief Engraver, made 

a bas-relief from the daguerreotype, and a facsimile 

of that bas-relief (which was of soft metal) was produced by the newly discovered art of electrotyping. 

Saxton then made an engraving of the electrotype 

with his medal ruling machine. This illustration 

(Figure 10) accordingly represents a combination 

of the three most scientific advances in graphic arts 

up to that time.i* Moreover, it could well be considered 

a "missing link" in the evolution of the methods used 

to jnake pictures. It was produced during the transition from medal ruling methods to daguerreotype 

photography, and it contains elements of both stages 

of that development. Just beneath the left side of this 

illustration of the building, in letters barely visible, one 

can detect the name "Gobrecht," and beneath the 

right side, the name "Saxton." 

When it was found that photographs of coins, medals, 

cameos, etc., could be produced just as accurately, 

and could be made with less effort and more speed 

than was possible by the medal ruling process, that 

process, stripped of its primary function, was headed 

for obsolescence. It now seems obvious that if photography had been invented a few years earlier, medal 

ruling would never have made an appearance. 

Although Saxton became a daguerreotype " buff," 

he did not immediately abandon his medal ruling 

activities. Figure 11, for example, contains two outstanding rulings of his friends and benefactors, 

Dr. Robert M. Patterson and Franklin Peale, both of 

which he produced with his steam-driven machine. 

Figure 12 shows his rulings, published in Godefs 

Lady's Book}^ of a medal which Congress awarded 

Commodore Edward Preble for having performed 

eminent services in the Tripolitan War of 1804. 

FIGURE 10.—The second United States Mint, from Eckfeldt and Du Bois' 1842 edition of A Manual 

of Gold and Silver Coins. (Courtesy Library of Congress) 
14 SMITHSONIAN STUDIES IN HISTORY AND TECHNOLOGY 

a 

FIGURE 11.—Engravings made by Saxton with his steam-driven medal ruling machine: a, Robert M. 

Patterson (courtesy Historical Society of Pennsylvania); b, Franklin Peale (courtesy American 

Philosophical Society). 

naMttW*******'^'TM— 

FIGURE 12.—Saxton's ruling of the Commodore Preble medal. 

(Courtesy Library of Congress) 
NUMBER 3 2 15 

America's First Diffraction Grating 

Although the main purpose for Saxton's machines 

was to make rulings from coins and medals, they were 

also capable of engraving straight, equally spaced 

lines exceedingly close together, such as are required 

for diffraction gratings. The steam-driven model was 

particularly well adapted for that purpose because of 

its even, steady motion, free from any of the irregularities which inevitably accompany manual operation. This machine was probably the best in the world 

for that purpose during the 1840s. As to how John 

William Draper (1811-1882), then America's leading 

scientist on the subject of the nature of light, learned 

about it does not appear in the records, but the 

combination of Saxton's machine and Draper's investigations are responsible for a major photographic 

achievement. 

Draper was then a professor of chemistry at New 

York University. In May 1843 he prevailed upon 

Saxton to rule for him a diffraction grating—probably 

the first of its kind to be made in America. The use 

he made of it was explained in his article, " Popular 

Exposition of Some Scientific Experiments, Part V.— 

the Diffraction Spectrum," which appeared in the 

1877 volume of Harper's New Monthly Magazine, 

extracts of which follow: 

a good grating or gitter is one of the most delicate 

and difficult of mechanicsJ problems; it has exercised the 

ingenuity of the most skillful mechanical artists. The surfaces 

of the glass must be truly plane, and the screw of the ruling 

apparatus perfect in its form and correct in its action; it must 

be driven by a uniformly acting motor power. The quality of 

the diamond is very impoitant; it must not lose its point or 

edge too readily, or the lines of the grating it is making will 

not be similar to each other. The figure of its cutting part is of 

the utmost moment, as on it depends the figure or foi m of the 

groove or scratch that is made. . . The grating I employed . . . was made for me by Mr. Saxton, at the United 

States Mint in Philadelphia, moie than thirty years ago. . . . 

The work it did for me I cannot but speak of it with admiration—it enabled me to make [in 1844] the first photograph 

that was ever executed of the diffraction spectrum. . . .^^ 

There is in the National Museum of History and 

Technology in Washington, a "Draper Collection," 

which the museum received from the National Academy of Sciences. In that collection is an assortment of 

diffraction gratings. One of them, ruled on a spectacle 

lens blank, with rulings occupying a space of about 

Yz by % inch, appears in Figure 13. It might well have 

been one of the lot which Saxton ruled for Draper on 

that historic occasion.-

FIGURE 13.—A diffraction grating 

(about actual size) from the 

Draper Collection, National 

Museum of History and 

Technology, Smithsonian 

Institution. 

Epilogue 

The sudden death, on 20 November 1843, of 

Ferdinand Rudolph Hassler, Superintendent of the 

United States Coast Survey, led to Saxton's rather 

abrupt departure from the Mint at Philadelphia. 

Professor Alexander Dallas Bache, Benjamin 

Franklin's great-grandson, had been appointed by 

President Tyler to succeed Hassler, whereupon 

Bache prevailed upon Saxton, a close friend, to move 

to Washington and to assume under his supervision 

immediate charge of the Office of Weights and 

Measures.^^ Saxton took over that position on 28 

February 1844, and held it until his death on 26 October 1873. 

Although Saxton took his manually operated ruling 

machine with him to Washington, no records have 

been found to indicate that he made any further use 

of it. On the day he died, his daughter gave birth to 

his only grandchild, Joseph Saxton Pendleton. By 

the time the boy reached the age of fourteen, the machine had become his property, and he deposited it 

with the Smithsonian Institution. It remained there 

from 1887 until 1935. By that time Joseph Pendleton 

had reached the age of 62, and had become a member 

of the Board of Directors of the Carpenter Steel 

Company in Reading, Pennsylvania. About this 

same time, the Franklin Institute in nearby Philadelphia had acquired the quarters it now occupies. 

Impressed with that organization and its excellent 

new facilities, and recalling his grandfather's interest and lifetime membership in it, Pendleton requested the Smithsonian to transfer the medal ruling 

machine, along with many other items which had 

belonged to his grandfather, to the Franklin Institute. The items were placed on exhibit there for a 

considerable period, but eventually the medal ruling 

machine was moved into storage where it remained until 1967, when it was sent back to the 

Smithsonian Institution. There it presently remains— 

in the storeroom of the Division of Graphic Arts at 

the National Museum of History and Technology.^^ 
Notes 

' Saxton's nomination for membership, presented 18 August 

1837, continues graciously: "After an absence in Europe of 

several yeais, wher e he gained great reputation, he returned to 

his native city, and we think his introduction into our Society 

a welcome of which he is every way worthy. " Nomination No. 

1074, American Philosophical Society. 

- For other aspects of Saxton's career, see y\RTHUR H. 

FRAZIER, "Joseph Saxton's First Sojourn at Philadelphia, 

1818-1831, an d His Contributions to the Independenc e Hall 

Clock," The Smithsonian Journal of History, 3 (1968) :45-76. 

^ Ibid., p. 48. Th e original letter is in the Nationa l Archives. 

* Mechanics' Magazine (London), No. 490 (29 Decembe r 

1832):194-196. 

5 VINCENT NOLTE , Memorial of Facts Connected with the History 

of Medallic Engraving and the Process of M. Collas (London, 1838), 

p. 17. See also, "Medalli c Engraving, " The Athenaeum, Journal 

of British and Foreign Literature (London), No. 466 (1 Octobe r 

1836):706-707. 

" Dr. Patterson's letter is in the National Archives, Record 

Grou p 104, Records of the Bureau of the Mint, "Peale " 

Correspondence 1829-1886. 

'"Memoi r of Joseph Saxton, 1799-1873, by Joseph Henry. 

Rea d before the National Academy, Oct. 4, 1874," Biographical 

Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences, 1 (1877) :219-316. 

^ Th e book was first published in Philadelphia at the Assay 

Office of the Mint, and the title page notes that it was "Illustrated by numerous engravings of coins executed by the Meda l 

Ruling Machine , and unde r the direction of Joseph Saxton of 

the United States Mint. " 

"JULIU S F . SACHSE, "Earl y Daguerreotype Days: An Historical Reminiscence, " The American Journal of Photography, 13 

(July 1892) :306-307. Sachse's article appeare d serially from 

Jun e through Decembe r 1892. See also D. JA Y CULVER, "Th e 

Camer a Opens Its Eye on America, " American Heritage, 8 

(Decembe r 1956) :49 et seq. 

' " SACHSE, op. cit., p. 408. 

'^ MARCU S AURELIUS ROOT , The Camera and the Pencil (Philadelphia : Root & Lippincott, 1864), p. 352. [Republished by 

Helios, 1971.] 

^^ Loc . cit. [note 10]. See also the magazine section of the 

Philadelphia Inquirer (17 Novembe r 1963), p. 12, in an article by 

WAYN E E . HOMAN , entitled "Pennsylvani a Heritage—Photography's- Beginnings.' ' 

13 SACHSE, op. cit. [note 9], 13 (Octobe r 1892): 455-459. 

'< JACO B R . ECKFELD T and WILLIAM E . D U BOIS, A Manual 

of Gold and Silver Coins (Philadelphia : A. Hart, 1851), p. 189. 

'5 "Th e Preble Medal, " Godey's Lady's Book (September 

1842): 109-111. 

'8 JOH N WILLIAM DRAPER , "Popula r Exposition of Some 

Scientific Experiments, Part V.—Th e Diffraction Spectrum, " 

Harper's New Monthly Magazine, L V (June-Novembe r 1877): 

417-428. See also JOH N WILLIAM DRAPER , Scientific Memoirs— 

Being Experimental Contributions to a Knowledge of Radiant Energy 

(1878): 117. 

" Biographical Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences, I 

(1877): 310. 

'^ Th e accession papers and card records maintained at the 

Franklin Institute and the Smithsonian Institution contain the 

dat a used to trace Saxton's medal ruling machine from 1887 

to the present. 

16 
Inde X 

Academy of Sciences (Paris), 9 

Alexander I (Czar of Russia), 2 

American Daily Advertiser, 9 

Ariadne, 6 

Bache, Alexander Dallas, 15 

Balance scale, 7 

Bate, John, 6, 8 

Bate, Mr. (Robert Brittell), 4, 6, 8 

British Museum, 6 

Carpenter Steel Company, 15 

Central High School (Philadelphia), 9, 11, 12 

Coast Survey. See United States Coast Survey 

Collas, Achille, 6 

Daguerreotype, 1, 9, 11, 12, 13 

Diagonal tracing arm, 3, 7, 8 

Diffraction grating, 15 

Diffraction spectrum, 15 

Draper collection, 15 

Draper, John William, 15 

Du Bois, William E., 9, 13 

Eckfeldt, Jacob R., 9, 

Electrotyping, 13 

13 

Franklin, Benjamin, 6 

Franklin Institute (Philadelphia), 1,15 

French Academy of Sciences. See Academy of Sciences (Paris) 

Gall, Dr. Franz, 3 

Gill, Mr., 6 

Gobrecht, Christian, 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 13 

Goddard, Dr. Paul Beck, 12 

Green and Ward (London), 6 

Hassler, Ferdinand Rudolph, 15 

Henry, Joseph, 9, 12 

Historical Society of Pennsylvania, 9 

Horizontal tracing arm, 3, 7, 8 

House of Commons (London), 6 

Huntingdon (Pennsylvania), 1 

McCahan, John, 1 

Medal ruling machine, 1, 6, 8, 15 

Medal rulings, 1, 13, 15 

Minerva, 6 

Mint. See United States Mint 

Moser, Mr., 12 

National Academy of Sciences (U.S.), 1, 9 

National Bureau of Standards (U.S.), 1 

National Museum of History and Technology, Smithsonian 

Institution, 15 

Newingham, David, 1 

New York University, 15 

Nolte, Vincent, 4, 6 

Office of Weights and Measures, 1,15 

Patents 

British, 6 

French, 6 

United States, 3, 9 

Patterson, Dr. Robert M., 1, 7, 9, 13 

Peale, Charles Willson, 6 

Peale, Franklin, 6, 13 

Pendleton, Joseph Saxton, 15 

Phrenology, 3 

Preble, Commodore Edward, 13 

Rogers, Professor James, 12 

Root, Marcus .\urelius, 11 

Rundell and Bridge (London), 6 

Saxton, Joseph, 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 12, 13, 15 

Smithsonian Institution, 15 

Smithsonian Institution .-\rchives, 3 

State Armory (Philadelphia), 9 

Trevellyan, Sir John, 3 

Trevellyan, Walter, 3, 6 

Tyler, John (President), 15 

United States Coast Survey, 1,15 

United States Gazette, 9 

United States Mint, 1, 6, 7, 8, 9, 12, 13 

John Wanamaker (store), 12 

Lachevardier and Company (Paris), 6 

Lukens, Isaiah, 1 

Vaughan, Petty, 6 

Widener Building (Philadelphia), 12 

Wolcott, .'Mexander S., 9 

17 

U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE :1975 O—572-510