Abstract
Professors of physics in nineteenth-century America had two options for procuring the apparatus that they needed to demonstrate the phenomena of physics to their students. Some apparatus was available from makers and dealers in Europe, mostly in France (for optical apparatus) and Germany. A few teachers, such as Ebenezer Snell of Amherst, made some of their own apparatus. The rest of the instruments came from the fledgling North American apparatus industry, based in Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and toward the end of the century, Chicago. In this article, I will discuss apparatus made by Chamberlain, Wightman, Davis, Ritchie, Pike and Ritchie, Queen, and then a few Chicago companies, and will give examples of some of their products. Toward the end of the century, a few colleges decided that the making of physics apparatus was a key adjunct of the experience of learning physics, and I will give some examples.
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Credit: Photo by the author

Credit: Photo by the author

Credit: Greenslade Collection

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Credit: Greenslade Collection


Credit: Greenslade Collection

Credit: From the photo archive of the Smithsonian Institution

Credit: Photo by the author

Credit: Photo by the author

Credit: Photo by the author

Credit: Greenslade Collection

Credit: Photo by the author

Credit: Photo by the author

Credit: Photo by the author

Credit: Photo by the author

Credit: Photo by the author

Credit: Photo by the author
References
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Franz Maria Epinus, or Aepinus (1724–1802), of German origin, spent much of his professional life in St. Petersburg, did extensive work on Benjamin Franklin’s fluid theory of electricity, and designed the parallel plate condenser.
This effect is discussed in Thomas B. Greenslade Jr. and Richard H. Howe, “A Modern Use of Volta’s Electroscope,” The Physics Teacher 19, no. 9 (1981), 614–15.
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This material is drawn from the author’s catalogue and exhibition of historical apparatus at Denison University in 1981, and from the following: Thomas B. Greenslade, “Denison Physics and Physicists, 1885–1905,” Denison Alumni Magazine, December 1982.
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Thomas B. Greenslade Jr., “A Vertical Sonometer,” The Physics Teacher 24, no. 2 (1986), 231–32.
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Thomas B. Greenslade Jr. taught physics at Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio, from 1964 to 2005. He received an AB from Amherst College in 1959 and a doctorate in physics from Rutgers University in 1965. He is a fellow of the American Physical Society and also the American Association of Physics Teachers, which awarded him the Millikan Medal in 2019.
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Greenslade, T.B. American Nineteenth-Century Manufacturers and Importers of Philosophical Apparatus. Phys. Perspect. 23, 202–230 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00016-021-00273-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00016-021-00273-5
Keywords
- instruments
- apparatus
- education
- pedagogy
- manufacture