Microscope
date: label: date made
content: 1870-1890
name: label: maker
content: Swift, James
notes: label: Description
content: Several London opticians began making small, simple and remarkably similar compound monoculars around 1870, and stressing their suitability for clinical and seaside use. The form featured a tripod base, one leg of which supported the microscope, stage, and sub-stage mirror. James Powell Swift termed his version “Blankley’s Small Pocket Microscope,” the reference being to the English microscopist, Frederick Blankley. This example belonged to Richard Halsted Ward (1837-1917), an American medical microscopist. It has a fine focus screw, a red leather case, and a “Swift” inscription. The objective is missing.
label: Description
content: Ref: “Swift’s Improved Pocket Medical and Seaside Microscope,” <i>The Lancet</i> 1 (1872): 764.
label: Description
content: James Swift, <i>Manufacturer of Microscopes, Portable & Equatorial Telescopes, and Other Optical Instruments</i> (London, n.d.), p. 15.
label: Description
content: James Swift, <i>The Microscope and Accessory Apparatus</i> (London, 1883), front cover and p. 81.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United Kingdom: England, London
topic: label: Subject
content: Science & Scientific Instruments
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Medicine
label: See more items in
content: Microscopes
label: See more items in
content: Science & Mathematics
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Miss Charlotte B. Ward
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: MG.M-09723
label: accession number
content: 174919
label: catalog number
content: M-09723
label: catalog number
content: 174919.08
objectType: label: Object Name
content: microscope
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: brass (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: glass (overall material)
label: Measurements
content: case: 1 5/8 in x 6 3/16 in x 3 15/16 in; 4.1275 cm x 15.71625 cm x 10.00125 cm