page_title: Great Exhibition
section_title: Exhibits
hierarchical_section_title: Great Exhibition / Exhibits
caption_attribution_description: Image taken from: Title: "The Half Hour Library of Travel, Nature and Science for young readers" Shelfmark: "British Library HMNTS 10027.ee." Volume: 03 Page: 237 Place of Publishing: London Date of Publishing: 1896 Publisher: James Nisbet &amp; Co. Issuance: monographic Identifier: 001567835 Explore: Find this item in the British Library catalogue, 'Explore'. Open the page in the British Library's itemViewer (page image 237) Download the PDF for this book Image found on book scan 237 (NB not a pagenumber)Download the OCR-derived text for this volume: (plain text) or (json) Click here to see all the illustrations in this book and click here to browse other illustrations published in books in the same year. Order a higher quality version from here.
context_page_description: The Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations or The Great Exhibition, an international exhibition, took place in Hyde Park, London, from 1 May to 15 October 1851. It was the first in a series of World's Fairs, exhibitions of culture and industry that became popular in the 19th century. The Great Exhibition was organised by Henry Cole and by Prince Albert, husband of the reigning monarch of the United Kingdom, Queen Victoria. Famous people of the time attended, including Charles Darwin, Karl Marx, Samuel Colt, members of the Orléanist Royal Family and the writers Charlotte Brontë, Charles Dickens, Lewis Carroll, George Eliot, Alfred Tennyson and William Makepeace Thackeray. The opening music, under the superintendence of William Sterndale Bennett was directed by Sir George Smart.
context_section_description: The official descriptive and illustrated catalogue of the event lists exhibitors not only from throughout Britain but also from its 'Colonies and Dependencies' and 44 'Foreign States' in Europe and the Americas. Numbering 13,000 in total, the exhibits included a Jacquard loom, an envelope machine, kitchen appliances, steel-making displays and a reaping machine that was sent from the United States.
  The Mintons stand exhibited ceramics including majolica which proved a world-wide success.
  The Koh-i-Noor, meaning the "Mountain of Light," the world's largest known diamond in 1851, was one of the most popular attractions of the India exhibit and was acquired in 1850 as part of the Lahore Treaty.
  The Daria-i-Noor, one of the rarest pale pink diamonds in the world, was shown.
  The early 8th-century Tara Brooch, discovered only in 1850, the finest Irish penannular brooch, was exhibited by the Dublin jeweller George Waterhouse along with a display of his fashionable Celtic Revival jewellery.
  Alfred Charles Hobbs used the exhibition to demonstrate the inadequacy of several respected locks of the day.
  Frederick Bakewell demonstrated a precursor to today's fax machine.
  Mathew Brady was awarded a medal for his daguerreotypes.
  William Chamberlin, Jr. of Sussex exhibited what may have been the world's first voting machine, which counted votes automatically and employed an interlocking system to prevent over-voting.
  The first modern pay toilets were installed, with 827,280 visitors paying the 1 penny fee to use them. The toilets remained even after the exhibition was dismantled. "Spending a penny" became a euphemism for using a toilet.
  Firearms manufacturer Samuel Colt demonstrated his prototype for the 1851 Colt Navy and also his older Walker and Dragoon revolvers.
  The Tempest prognosticator, a barometer using leeches, was demonstrated at the Great Exhibition.
  The America's Cup yachting event began with a race held in conjunction with the Great Exhibition.
  Gold ornaments and silver enamelled handicrafts fabricated by the Sunar caste from Sind, British India.
  C.C. Hornung of Copenhagen, Denmark, showed his single-cast iron frame for a piano, the first made in Europe.
  "The Trophy Telescope", so called because it was considered the "trophy" of the exhibition, was shown. Its main lens of 11 inches (280mm) aperture and 16 feet (4.9m) focal length was manufactured by Ross of London. The German equatorial mounting was made by Ransome & May of Ipswich.
  The instrument maker J. S. Marratt exhibited a five-foot achromatic telescope and a transit theodolite used in surveying, tunnelling, and for astronomical purposes.
  Asprey exhibited a kingwood and ormolu mounted lady's dressing case with silver-gilt contents bearing the 'Annie' cipher.
caption: A telescope at the 1851 exhibit
exif: {"Image Copyright": "Public Domain, from the British Library's collections, 2013"}