Spectrophotometer, Coleman Model 6B
date: label: date made
content: 1949-1964
name: label: maker
content: Coleman
notes: label: Description
content: The Coleman Electric Company of Maywood, Illinois, was organized by Edwin Dewitt Coleman in the 1930s, made “precision tools for the technologist” during World War II, and became Coleman Instruments in the 1940s. It was bought by Perkin-Elmer in 1964, and became the Coleman Instrument Division of that firm.
label: Description
content: The spectrophotometers that Coleman Electric introduced in 1938 were designed by (or in conjunction with) Robert W. Wood, a noted professor of optical physics at The Johns Hopkins University, and they incorporated Wood’s replica diffraction gratings. By 1955, Coleman was boasting that over 10,000 of these instruments were in use in industrial, medical and academic laboratories all over the world.
label: Description
content: Coleman boasted in 1947 that their 6A Junior spectrophotometer “offers today’s technologist an improved design of the famous ‘Army Clinical Model 6’—official with the British and American Army Medical Corps.” The 6B spectrophotometer, introduced in 1949, was designed to meet the requirements of the American Oil Chemists Association, an organization that had recently adopted spectrophotometry as the approved method for measuring and expressing oil color.
label: Description
content: A tag on the front of this example reads “JUNIOR / SPECTROPHOTOMETER / PATENTS PENDING” and “PH COLEMAN” and “COLEMAN INSTRUMENTS INC. / MAYWOOD, ILLINOIS, U.S.A.” and “INST. NO. / 3744” and “MODEL 6B.”
label: Description
content: Ref: Edwin D. Coleman, “Spectrophotometer,” U.S. Patent 2,339,053 (Jan. 11, 1944).
label: Description
content: “Coleman Junior Spectrophotometers!” ad in <i>Analytical Chemistry</i> 19 (March 1947): 23A.
label: Description
content: “Notice to Oil Chemists,” ad in <i>Analytical Chemistry</i> 21 (June 1949): 22A.
label: Description
content: “Coleman Spectrophotometers,” ad in <i>Analytical Chemistry</i> 27 (March 1955): 14A.
label: Description
content: “Two Ex-Wives Benefit From Coleman Will,” <i>Chicago Tribune</i> (Aug. 25, 1959), p. C5.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United States: Illinois, Maywood
topic: label: Subject
content: Science & Scientific Instruments
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Chemistry
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Gift of Department of Chemistry, Lehigh University
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: CH.337147
label: catalog number
content: 337147
label: accession number
content: 1979.0432
objectType: label: Object Name
content: Spectrophotometer
label: Object Name
content: spectrophotometer
physicalDescription: label: Measurements
content: overall: 17 cm x 25.8 cm x 35.6 cm; 6 11/16 in x 10 3/16 in x 14 in
label: Measurements
content: overall: 6 5/8 in x 10 in x 14 in; 16.8275 cm x 25.4 cm x 35.56 cm