Water Current Meter
date: label: date made
content: 1871-1898
name: label: inventor
content: Safford, Arthur T.
label: maker
content: Buff & Berger
notes: label: Description
content: This modification of the Fteley-Stearns meter is marked “BUFF & BERGER / BOSTON” and thus was made between 1871 and 1898. The Proprietors of the Locks and Canals in Lowell, Mass., donated it to the Smithsonian in 1956.
label: Description
content: This was probably designed by Arthur T. Safford, a hydraulic engineer who was associated with the Locks and Canals for over fifty years. Safford’s modification of the Fteley-Stearns meter, available by 1911, had fewer vanes than the original (five rather eight), a larger rotor (5 inches diameter rather than 3.5-inch), and a somewhat heavier frame. This example has six vanes, a 5-inch diameter rotor, and a heavier frame. A paper in the box shows that it was rated in 1911.
label: Description
content: Ref: Hector Hughes and Arthur T. Safford, <i>A Treatise on Hydraulics</i> (New York, 1911), pp. 254-257.
label: Description
content: Arthur H. Frazier, <i>Water Current Meters in the Smithsonian Collections of the National Museum of History and Technology</i> (Washington, D.C., 1974), p. 60.
label: Description
content: “Arthur T. Safford,” <i>Boston Globe</i> (April 4, 1951), p. 25.
label: Description
content: "Arthur Truman Safford," <i>Journal of the Boston Society of Civil Engineers</i> 38-39 (1951).
label: Description
content: Hunter Rouse, <i>Hydraulics in the United States, 1776-1976</i> (Institute of Hydraulic Research).
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United States: Massachusetts, Boston
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Physical Sciences
label: See more items in
content: Water Currents
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content: Measuring & Mapping
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Proprietors of the Locks and Canals
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: PH.314771
label: accession number
content: 211155
label: catalog number
content: 314771
objectType: label: Object Name
content: water current meter
physicalDescription: label: Measurements
content: overall: 5 in; 12.7 cm
label: Measurements
content: overall: 11 1/2 in x 10 in x 7 3/8 in; 29.21 cm x 25.4 cm x 18.7325 cm