Camera Lucida
notes: label: Description
content: William Hyde Wollaston (1766-1828) was an English chemist who, in 1806, applied for a British patent (#2993) for “An Instrument whereby any person may draw in Perspective, or may Copy of Reduce any Print or Drawing.” In 1807, he dubbed this instrument a camera lucida.
label: Description
content: Spencer Fullerton Baird (1823-1887), the naturalist who served as the second Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, wrote to his brother William in January 1844: “I wish you could feel rich enough to buy a Camera Lucida. I am full of the idea of making drawings of the Bills, feet, wings & tails of all our birds & it cannot be done accurately without a camera. M’Allister has an excellent one second hand which he offers for 7 dollars. It is the most complete one I ever saw, being fixed for magnified drawing. If you will buy it, I will pay you as I get the money.” In a letter to John James Audubon two years later, Baird noted that “I have got a Camera Lucida now and intend trying to draw with it.” The camera lucida mentioned in these Baird letters may this one in our collections. It is a Wollaston-type instrument with two extra lenses. The “ACKERMANN & Co / Repository of Arts / THE STRAND” label in the box is that of Rudolph Ackermann (1764-1834), a German businessman who settled in London and, in 1795, established a print shop and drawing school. Ackermann’s monthly journal, the <i>Repository of Arts, Literature, Fashions</i>, began publication in 1809.
label: Description
content: Ref: William Hyde Wollaston, “Description of the Camera Lucida,” <i>Philosophical Magazine</i> 27 (1807): 343-347.
label: Description
content: Spencer F. Baird to William M. Baird, Jan. 31, 1844, in William Healey Dall, <i>Spencer Fullerton Baird</i> (Philadelphia, 1915), pp. 108-109.
label: Description
content: Ruthven Deane, ed., “Unpublished Letters of John James Audubon and Spencer F. Baird,” <i>The Auk</i> 24 (1907): 53-70, on 65.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
topic: label: Subject
content: Science & Scientific Instruments
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Physical Sciences
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: PH.284263
label: catalog number
content: 284263
label: accession number
content: 55865
objectType: label: Object Name
content: Camera Lucida
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: brass (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: glass (overall material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 1 3/16 in x 9 in x 3 in; 3.048 cm x 22.86 cm x 7.62 cm
label: Measurements
content: overall: 1 1/4 in x 9 in x 2 7/8 in; 3.175 cm x 22.86 cm x 7.3025 cm