Model of a Thermodynamic Surface for an Abnormal Three-State by Richard P. Baker, Baker #259
date: label: date made
content: ca 1910
label: date made
content: ca 1905-1935
name: label: maker
content: Baker, Richard P.
notes: label: Description
content: In the 1870s physicists in Scotland and the United States began to make three-dimensional models of the thermal properties of matter. This plaster model of a thermodynamic surface has a wooden frame painted black. A paper sticker reads: No. 259 (/) Abnormal 3-state (/) Diagrammatic.
label: Description
content: This is one of a series of nine models University of Iowa mathematician Richard P. Baker made that relate to thermodynamic surfaces. It was designed under the supervision of his German-born colleague Karl Eugen Guthe (1866–1915), who taught in the physics department there from 1905 until 1909. The model remained in Baker’s catalog as late as 1931. This particular example of the model was on loan for exhibition at MIT from 1939 until the mid-1950s. It, along with the other models in accession 211257, came to the Smithsonian from MIT in 1956.
label: Description
content: For general references, see MA.304723.045.
label: Description
content: R. P. Baker delivered a paper to the April 1910 meeting of the Chicago section of the American Mathematical Society that was entitled "On a class of equations representing normal and abnormal three-state bodies." A summary - which gives equations - is given in the reference cited and used to give a rough date of 1910 for the model.
label: Description
content: Reference:
label: Description
content: Slaught, H.E., "April Meeting of the Chicago Section, " Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society, vol. 16, 1910, p. 458, 462.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
topic: label: Subject
content: Mathematics
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Mathematics
label: See more items in
content: Science & Mathematics
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Gift of Frances E. Baker
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: MA.211257.047
label: accession number
content: 211257
label: catalog number
content: 211257.047
objectType: label: Object Name
content: geometric model
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: plaster (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: wood (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: metal (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: brown (overall color)
label: Physical Description
content: blue (overall color)
label: Physical Description
content: gray (overall color)
label: Physical Description
content: pink (overall color)
label: Physical Description
content: plaster cast, screwed. (overall production method/technique)
label: Measurements
content: average spatial: 5 in x 10 5/32 in x 8 1/32 in; 12.7 cm x 25.79878 cm x 20.39874 cm