Robert Boyle’s workdiaries

Robert Boyle, the great English scientist, died 330 years ago today. Famed for his role as the father of chemistry and modern experimental methods, he is also known for discovering Boyle’s Law, various inventions, and for leaving behind a large number of writings, not least his workdiaries. These latter have been made freely available online thanks to the Robert Boyle Project at Birkbeck College, London.

Boyle was born in 1627, son of Richard Boyle, an Elizabethan adventurer-colonist who made his fortune in Ireland and became ennobled as the 1st Earl of Cork. (Richard Boyle, in fact, was a noted diarist - see The Diary Junction and The Great Earl of Cork.) He studied for a short while at Eton before travelling on the Continent with a French tutor. After returning to England in 1644, he went to live at a manor in Stalbridge, Dorset, inherited from his father. He also tried moving to Ireland, where he owned other estates, but by the 1650s was living mostly in Oxford where he associated with a group of natural philosophers.

Boyle’s travels abroad had given him a taste for scientific research, and, although his first writings had largely been concerned with moral and literary aspects of life, once in Oxford he began to focus more on science. A first achievement - improvements to the air-pump invented in Germany - came with the help of Robert Hooke; and in 1660 Boyle published New Experiments: Physico-Mechanical, Touching the Spring of the Air, and its Effects: Made, for the most part, in a New Pneumatical Engine.

In the early 1660s, Boyle described in print what has since become known as Boyle’s Law, i.e. that there is an inversely proportional relationship between the absolute pressure and volume of a gas, if the temperature is kept constant within a closed system. Around the same time he also became a founding member of the Royal Society, as incorporated by Charles II (though later when elected President he declined the honour). In 1668 he moved to London, where he lived at the house of his sister, and where he continued to experiment and write until his death on 31 December 1691. Among his more significant publications during this period were: Experiments, Notes, &, about the Mechanical Origin or Production of Divers Particular Qualities; sequels to his New Experiments; Memoirs for the Natural History of Human Blood; and Medicina Hydrostatica.

See the Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy or Wikipedia for further biographical information. However, there is also a large amount of information about Boyle on the Robert Boyle Project website hosted by Birkbeck College, part of the University of London. In 2001, the Project published an online edition of Boyle’s so-called workdiaries, written between 1647 and 1691. More recently, the workdiaries have been given their own website hosted by Cell (Centre for Editing Lives and Letters).

The Project website says: ‘These modest-looking bundles of papers and stitched books, some stained with chemicals and covered with notes and comments, reveal the methods and procedures of Boyle’s scientific enquiries.’ They also include ‘records of recipes, measurements, apparatus and data collection, as well as notes from Boyle’s reading and conversations with travellers and artisans.’ Here’s two tasters of the workdiaries taken from the start of workdiary 16

1 January 1657
‘Take Linseed Oyle {pound}1 frankinsence {pound}; comon Amber {ounce} 2 Gummi Lacca {ounce} 1; Aloes {ounce} 2 Beat the Amber by it selfe & melt it by it selfe Beat the Gumme into fine powder Boyle all these with a gentle fire 2 houres (keeping the Liquor constantly stirring with a Stick least it Burne) till the Materialls be perfectly dissolv’d in the Oyle And then have you made your vernish to guild Leather with’.

2 January 1657
‘Take Aquila Cælestis & dissolve it in as much water as will barely suffice for the solution of it, In this Liquor dissolve as much Sal Infernalis as you can in a gentle heat Then let it stand in the open aire, (stirring it often) till the humidity be evaporated & the bodies united this masse you may if need be once more moisten/original pagination, with the Solution of the Infernall Salt & to make it dry the sooner you may Incorporate it with sifted bone=ashes & when it is perfectly dry draw it over with a strong fire & if need be severall Cohobations, In like maner you may imbibe the fixt Salt of the Homogeneous Menstruum with as much of the dissolvd volatile Salt or Sp: of the same as the fixt salt will retaine & Conjunction being made in the open aire the united Salts may be drawne over with Due Cohobation as formerly’.

This article is a slightly revised version of one first published on 31 December 2011.

I just shot a bear

‘ “Good evening, Mr. Baldwin, did you hear shooting just now?”
“No. Why?”
“I just shot a bear down the channel.”
“Well, we’ll go back to camp, hitch up a team, and bring him in.” ’ This is an extract from the diary of Russell Williams Porter - architect, artist, Arctic explorer and telescope maker - born 150 years ago today. Although the diaries of his expeditions to the Arctic remain unpublished, Porter himself quotes from them in a memoir which was published, albeit posthumously.   

Porter was born on 13 December 1871 in Springfield, Vermont. His father was an inventor, toy manufacturer and a successful producer of baby carriages. Russell was schooled at Vermont Academy in 1891 and went on to take engineering at Norwich University and the University of Vermont, later studying architecture and art at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He became interested in the Arctic when he attended lectures on Greenland by Robert Peary. In 1893, he signed up to sail on the ship Miranda as surveyor and artist for Frederick Cook’s voyage to Greenland that next year. The voyage ended with the ship colliding with an iceberg and the crew being rescued by Inuit. He continued to travel to the Arctic with Peary, and Greenland again in 1896, to Baffin Island in 1897, with the Yukon gold rush in 1898, to Labrador in 1899, and northern Greenland in 1900.

In 1901 and 1903, Porter was given charge of astronomical observations on the Ziegler Polar Expeditions financed by the industrialist William Ziegler. However, during the second expedition, the vessel, the Steam Yacht America, was crushed by ice and sank, and it was two years before the crew were rescued. In 1906, Porter joined a surveying expedition to Alaska’s Denali. After his Arctic adventures, Porter settled down in Port Clyde, Maine, where he tried farming and other ways to make a living. He married Alice Marshall, the postmistress, and they had one daughter. He took up astronomy and telescope making. In 1915, he returned to MIT as a professor of architecture, and during the war he worked for the National Bureau of Standards producing prisms and experimenting with the silvering of mirrors.

Porter moved back to Springfield, Vermont, in 1919 to work at the Jones & Lamson Machine Company, of which James Hartness was president. He helped Hartness to produce an optical comparator, an instrument for accurately checking the pitch, form, and lead of screw threads. He designed the Porter Garden Telescope, an innovative ornamental telescope. With Hartness, he also started a class in making telescopes, and this led to the forming of a small astronomical club. Porter contributed to regular articles in the Scientific American magazine, and to three volumes of the book Amateur Telescope Making. From 1928, he worked at the California Institute for technology on the development of the Hale Telescope, the largest in the world at the time, later to be housed at Palomar Observatory. During World War II, the Hale project was stalled, and Porter produced mechanical drawings for government defence projects. He died in 1949. Further information is available from Wikipedia, the Online Archive of California, and Prologue Magazine at the National Archives.

Porter’s papers were donated to the US National Archives and Records Service in 1974 by his daughter, Caroline Porter Kier. In addition to many artworks, the papers contain diaries, correspondence, notebooks, photographs, and memorabilia. There is also a manuscript and typescript, with nearly 100 drawings, of his memoir. This memoir was eventually edited by Herman Friis and published by University Press of Virginia in 1976 as The Arctic Diary of Russell Williams Porter. Porter began writing the memoir soon after settling in California, many years after his Arctic expeditions - indeed the book’ title is a misnomer. The published memoir includes many of the drawings and paintings he completed while on the expeditions, and, occasionally, verbatim extracts from diaries he kept. These extracts are mostly insubstantial and undated, and sometimes the difference between memoir text and diary quote is unclear. A digital copy can be freely borrowed online at Internet Archive. Here are a couple of extracts from the memoir in which Porter does refer to his diaries.

1899
‘I have told this bear story hundreds of times, and everybody knows how a bear story takes on added thrills at each telling, but I can only offer my diary written and the testimony of Mr. Baldwin, who visited the spot soon after. I met him walking out from camp.

"Good evening, Mr. Baldwin, did you hear shooting just now?”
“No. Why?”
“I just shot a bear down the channel.”
“Well, we’ll go back to camp, hitch up a team, and bring him in.”
Which we did.

“You needn't take my word for it, Mr. Baldwin,” after describing the adventure and as we approached the scene of the fracas. “There is the whole story right there on the snow - footprints, blood, bear - everything.”

On the way to camp I asked to have the skin of that bear and was refused. All I have to remember of the affair is the bear’s jaws, which I chopped off the head after the dogs had eaten the meat and torn the skin to pieces.

There seems to be some question as to whether a polar bear will voluntarily attack a white man. The governor of Umanak, Greenland, once told me of an Eskimo hunting at a seal hole through the ice. The bear came up from behind and got his claws into the fellow’s back. Somehow the Eskimo got hold of his gun, pointed it over his shoulder and shot the bear. The fellow’s back was covered with scars.

However. I am just as well pleased not to have had to prove or disprove the theory. You may be sure that thereafter I saw to it that my rifle was always in working order.’

1903
‘The hundred days in that near-starvation camp (we were on less than half rations) would have proved a godsend to a writer who could portray with true dramatic sense the influence of the long night over the characters fate had thrown so closely together. Take the matter of food - and it was vile stuff, walrus meat that an Eskimo will eat only if he is starving. Now cut this food in half.

I quote here at length from my diary: “But you at home would be surprised if you tried it to see what a craving the flesh would feel should you stop eating before you had had what you wanted.” The favorite topic, of course, was what we would eat if we returned to the States. The dream of the sailors, almost to a man, was a full meal of ham and eggs. The field department was more particular.

The most interesting character was, by far, the skipper, a weatherworn whaler from Edgartown (Mass.), wise about oil, grease, blubber, bone, and ships. He did a good deal of his thinking aloud. I never got a word of it, and probably few of the sailors did. They were sort of stage asides.

The diary has him remark: “Guns? Rifles? Mr. Porter, how many rifles do you think I have bought and sold in my lifetime? I might say thousands. And as for walrus, I’ve seen them so thick you could not see anything else, thousands on thousands of ’em. But we never fool with ’em on our side [meaning Alaska]. Only Norwegians go walrusing, and they can live on almost anything. Why, these walrus here are nothing. I’ve seen, I suppose, tusks three feet long without any exaggeration, and yet there is someone thinks they can tell me something about walrus and how to shoot ’em. They don’t know what they’re talking about, that’s all there is to that.” On and on in this puffed-up strain.

Diary: “This morning when the captain took down his ham tin (full of snow water for washing purposes) hung up by the stovepipe, he found something in it which he had unwittingly scooped up along with the snow in the dark, something as big as my fist, and I would give twenty-five dollars to know who did it.” I never saw him so wrought up with the world at large, ordering me to remove the matches from the wall over his table so that no one would have occasion to come into his corner.

However, someone did invade his corner in a hurry. The lie was passed between two sailors over in the other end of the room, and quick as a flash they came over, giving it to each other in earnest. When they arrived with a bang, over went my oil lamp, the covering over a window fell in, and down came the captain’s table with its contents.

Now that we are on fights, here’s another.

Diary: “The skipper is sitting in his chair mumbling, delivering his usual asides, and the crew is conversing in low tones - some have disappeared into their bunks - when one notices loud talk down the passage by the kitchen.

“Look out now.”
“Don’t you touch me. I’m a sick man.”
“You’re no more sick than I am. Look out now.”
“Bill Ross, if you should hit me now, I would drop like a dead dog. If you ever dare strike me, I will run this knife through your heart.”

A quick, shuffling sound; an oil lamp tumbles to the floor sputtering in its spilt oil; a sound as of a man’s wind being slowly cut off growing fainter and fainter until a sharp metallic ring is heard as the knife falls from relaxing fingers. A man emerges from the passage and throws a long sheath knife on the table in front of the captain.

“Dere, captain, you see, over six inches long - eight, if an inch. I’ve half a mind to run it into him now.” And he makes a move for the knife but does not take it.

These pleasant little affairs at least had the merit of breaking the long monotony. Monotony was there all right, for the next entry (December 21) says: “At last after days and days of waiting, this ‘red letter’ day has arrived. After all, it only means that the sun has stopped going down.”

[. . .]

Diary: “It was the dogs that worried us - I mean their lives. You must remember that we had just emerged from an arctic winter, subsisting on half rations, and were in no physical condition to meet a severe test of staying powers.”

[. . .]

The fifth day found us on an island within sight of the old winter quarters of the Baldwin expedition; that is, we could have seen it had it been clear weather. Here we were held prisoner two days by drift.

Diary: “P.M., March 4. As I feared, bad weather has caught us. We have made only three miles a day for nearly a week. Yesterday the whole afternoon was required to make something under a mile. But we hope for the best. Six of my fingers are badly blistered.”

But the storm that held us in sight of our goal for two days had a silver lining. It packed or blew away the soft snow, making better going, and at the old West Camp we were furiously burning anything at hand to melt enough snow to quench our thirst.

[. . .]

Diary: “Hello, Chips. Come in.”

The bottle was placed on the table before us. It was half full, and I applied my nose to the opening.

“Why, it’s beer,” I exclaimed in surprise. “Where did you find it? And L. Macks Olbrygurie, Tromsø, too. Run across some old cache of the Baldwin expedition?”
“No, no; help yourselves.”

I looked at him. The perspiration was standing out in big drops over his forehead, and he seemed to find difficulty in breathing. Surely, I thought, this fellow has been hitting it rather heavily. Nevertheless, I filled two cups and offered one to Mr. Peters.

“Well, anyway, here’s to - to - the relief ship’s coming this year.” It was all I could think of worth a toast. Even then I couldn’t understand.
“You don’t understand, Mr. Porter, you don’t catch on,” the carpenter protested.

Then Peter’s face began to change. Then, not until then, did the arrival of a ship enter my mind.

“Chips, the ship hasn’t come?”
“Yes.”
“Come, no joking.”
“Yes, it has, it has.”
“Say it again.”
“The ship is at Cape Dillon. The party is at the house now.”

It was hard to believe even then, with so many rumors of ships about. With shaking hands, Mr. Peters and I drained the aluminum cups to the sand dregs and followed the carpenter down to the house. Turning to me, Peters smiled (he rarely smiled when with me) and said, “There’s no need for economizing on paper now.” ’

Saw television!

‘Met John Logie Baird; a charming man - a shy, quietly-spoken Scot. He could serve as a model for the schoolboy’s picture of a shock-haired, modest, dreamy, absent-minded inventor. Nevertheless shrewd.’ This is from the diary of Sydney Moseley, a journalist and writer, who died seventy years ago today; but, he is not well-remembered other than for his association with Baird, and writing a biography of the inventor.

There is very little information about Moseley readily available on the internet. He was born in 1888, and became a journalist, working initially for the Daily Express. For some years he lived in Cairo, editing English-language newspapers and acting as a foreign correspondent for The New York Times and others. Back in Britain, he founded the Southend Times and also stood for election to Parliament as a member for Southend-on-Sea.

Moseley worked to promote the invention - a television broadcast system - of his friend John Logie Baird, and was instrumental in persuading the BBC to try it out. There is a little more about this on the BBC website.

Moseley authored many books during his life. Truth about the Dardanelles and With Kitchener in Cairo were published during the First World War. Books on London, about the criminal system, and making investments followed. Most well known, though, are his books on television, including Who’s Who in Broadcasting; Simple Guide to Television; and Television for the Intelligent Amateur. His best remembered work is probably the 1952 biography of his friend, John Baird, The Romance and Tragedy of the Pioneer of Television.

A little while before Moseley’s death - on 5 December 1961 - Max Parrish published The Private Diaries of Sydney Moseley in association with Moseley’s own publisher in Bournemouth, The Outspoken Press. Used copies are available at Abebooks. The diaries are said to be a ‘startlingly frank record of a poor, ambitious boy’s struggle to make good’. Here are a few extracts.

31 March 1911
‘(Fleet Street) And now, after a week of continuous work, I can rest awhile and write my thoughts. Ten minutes ago I hadn’t a penny in my pocket; now I have over £4! Watney offered me the ‘night news-editor’ job and I accepted - again on space! This means that anything I write through the night which is printed will be paid for. I can ‘order’ any stories from our correspondents in the provinces, too. I think he has a good opinion of me, and this has been strengthened by the report of Sir William Bull, who was ‘very pleased’ with what I did. As regards the work I am about to do, he added: ‘there are great possibilities’ in it, and I am of course going to make use of most of them. According to Watney’s description, it is a post I should love; but I must take care of my health. It is now 6:30pm and I have had nothing to eat since 8 this morning!’

12 April 1911
‘(The Old Victoria Park) I should really be in bed but here I am! Been too busy to write these notes; it seems as if I have made a really good start on the Evening Times. Given a chance at last I am seizing it with both hands. Despite my column stories I am none too confident. I’ve already has some experience of the vagaries of journalism, thank you! It is very easy to slip. Have ordered suit, overcoat and writing desk. The Census job fairly unnerved me. Had to go into terribly poor quarters of the East End slums. St Peter’s Road in Mile End, where I lived, was a paradise in comparison - with trees and a church at one end, and the Charrington brewery at the other! What terrible lives some people endure! I thought I had seen enough! Dead people . . . dying people . . . starving people. There was a beautiful slut sitting beside a coffin. Beneath her rags and dirt was a queen. . . Wrote an article on my experiences which will be published - I hope!

Today I put 10s down as ‘extra’ expenses, and it’s going to Watney for his OK. Careful my lad, careful!’

1 August 1928
‘Met John Logie Baird; a charming man - a shy, quietly-spoken Scot. He could serve as a model for the schoolboy’s picture of a shock-haired, modest, dreamy, absent-minded inventor. Nevertheless shrewd. We sat and chatted. He told me he is having a bad time with the scoffers and sceptics - including the BBC and part of the technical press - who are trying to ridicule and kill his invention of television at its inception. I told him that if he would let me see what he has actually achieved - well, he would have to risk me damning it - or praising it! If I were convinced - I would battle for him. We got on well together and I have arranged to test his remarkable claim.

(Later) Saw television! Baird’s partner, a tall good-looking but highly temperamental Irishman, Captain Oliver George Hutchinson, was nice but very nervous of chancing it with me. He was terribly anxious I should be impressed. Liked the pair of them, especially Baird, and decided to give my support. . . I think we really have what is called television. And so, once more into the fray!’

9 March 1956
‘(Bournemouth) Today is my 68th birthday - and it is time I finally closed my diaries! Would that it were possible to close my mind with equal emphasis. Thoughts, ideas, views continue to chase each other. . . How will it really end?

What comparisons can one make with the past? Were my times the ‘good old days’? Or were they, as our modern progressives call them, the ‘bad old days’? Well - where are we today? We have: penicillin; hydrogen bombs; radio; plastics; Teddy-boys; modern plumbing; Bikini suits; pheno-barbitone; television; cafetarias; automobiles for all; telephones for all; a broken sound-barrier; long-playing records; inflation; diesel engines; higher wages; guided missiles, and aspirin tablets which dissolve much more quickly than ever before. Are we any happier? - more secure? - really better off? One could write much on the subject, and the ensuing discussion would go on ‘far, far into the night’.’

This article is a slightly revised version of one first published on 5 December 2011.

My ether was acid

‘The substance dissolves much more readily in Ether than in Alcohol. A hot solution of Ether deposits crystals as it cools. A glass rod dipped in it and exposed to the air is instantly covered with the substance in white powder from the evaporation of the ether. Query acidity of solution? My ether was acid.’ This is an early entry in the prosaic scientific notebooks kept by Michael Faraday, a great English scientist born 230 years ago today. Although all the entries - spanning over 40 years - are technical in the extreme, full of scientific notation, they were first published, in seven volumes in the 1930s, as Faraday’s Diary.

Faraday was born on 22 September 1791 in what is now Southwark in south London. His father had been apprenticed to a blacksmith, and young Michael received little education before he was apprenticed to a bookbinder and bookseller at the age of 14. The position gave him access to books, and he read avidly, trying to improve himself and to learn about science, especially electricity.

In 1812, Faraday attended lectures given by the chemist Humphry Davy at the Royal Institution. Subsequently, Faraday wrote to Davy asking for a job, which led to him being appointed as a chemical assistant at the Royal Institution. Davy also took Faraday with him on an 18 month tour of Europe, during which time they met many prominent scientists. In 1821, he married Sarah Barnard, but they were to have no children. That same year, he published his work on electromagnetic rotation (the principle behind the electric motor); and in 1826 he founded the Royal Institution’s Friday Evening Discourses and Christmas Lectures, giving many of the lectures himself.

In 1831, Faraday discovered electromagnetic induction, the principle behind the electric transformer and generator, and thereafter he continued to help pave the way for the widespread development of electricity as an accessible source of energy. He is credited with coining many now-familiar words, such as electrode, cathode and ion. He was appointed Scientific Adviser to the Admiralty in 1829, was Professor of Chemistry at the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, between 1830 and 1851 and Scientific Adviser to Trinity House from 1836 to 1865. He died in 1867 at Hampton Court (where he had been given official lodgings in recognition of his contribution to science). Further information is available at Wikipedia, the Royal Institution, the BBC, Encyclopaedia Britannica and the Science History Institute.

Faraday kept very detailed observations about his work and experiments for over 40 years. These scientific notebooks or diaries were bequeathed by him to the Royal Institution which then oversaw their publication - as Faraday’s Diary - in seven volumes in the 1930s. In 2008, the institution reprinted the whole series ‘as edited by Thomas Martin with index, photographs and thousands of illustrations in Faraday’s own hand’. According to institution: ‘Faraday is generally held to be one of the greatest of all experimental philosophers. Nearly every science is in his debt: and some sciences owe their existence mainly to his work. The liquefaction of gases, benzene, electro-magnetic induction, specific inductive capacity, lines of force, magnetic conduction or permeability, the dark discharge, anode, cathode, magneto-optics, electro-chemical equivalent; all these terms suggest fundamental researches which he made, and many of them were called into existence in order to describe his discoveries.’

The new edition can be previewed here, and some volumes of the first edition are freely available at Internet Archive. However, although titled ‘diary’ the work would be better described as scientific notebooks. There are no entries with domestic or personal details, for example, they are all focused entirely on his scientific work - here’s a couple of sample extracts from early on in the first volume, and a screenshot of one double-page spread in the third volume.

3 October 1820
‘Put Oleft. oil into a retort - exhausted - introduced chlorine- exposed to light - after the action introduced a little water - this absorbed the M.A. Gas and made a fresh vacuum - let in more chlorine and again exposed to light, shaking the retort - fresh action, then more chlorine - when the substance all changed, filled up the retort with water so as to wash out the acid well - repeated washing - dissolved the substance in alcohol and crystallised. This saves exhausting by the air pump which is very injurious to the instrument.’

5 October 1820
‘The crystals of the substance (from a strong alcoholic solution) were very brittle and crumbled into a white powder very easily. It is on this account difficult to preserve them. They were taken out of the Alcohol, dried by pressure between filtering paper, exposed to the air for half an hour and then put into a bottle. The substance was then a white dry powder.

The Alcoholic solution spontaneously evaporated; left crystals of the substance but they evaporated also in an hour or two afterwards.

The crystals by sublimation are much tougher than those formed from solutions.

The substance dissolves much more readily in Ether than in Alcohol. A hot solution of Ether deposits crystals as it cools. A glass rod dipped in it and exposed to the air is instantly covered with the substance in white powder from the evaporation of the ether.

Query acidity of solution? My ether was acid.

A drop of the etherial solution put on a glass plate instantly expands, evaporates and its surface becomes covered with square crystalline plates, the crystals being dendritic and their axes lying parallel to the diagonals of the square. In this way the substance may be got very dry.

Water dissolves but a very small portion of it when boiled with it.

The solution of it in Alcohol is not acid - and is not precipitated by Nitrate of silver.

Solution of potash does not dissolve it perceptibly by boiling -  nor Ammonia (strong). Muriatic acid does act on it.

Nitric acid (strong) boiled upon it dissolves a portion but does not decompose it: as it cools the substance deposits again unaltered. The concentrated acid diluted lets more of the substance fall; and then filtered and tested by N. of Silver gave no precipitate - hence no chlorine separated from the substance by it.

Put into strong Sul. Acid it very slowly sinks to the bottom, hence its S.G.; boiled with the acid the acid became brown, probably from some little pieces of dirt that were mixed with the substance. The substance sublimed from and through the acid unaltered and the acid tested contained no Mur. Acid or chlorine. It was not precipitated by water, hence no substance dissolved.’

Reith on Hitler, Churchill

Baron Reith of Stonehaven, the first and very influential manager of the British Broadcasting Company (later Corporation - BBC), died half a century ago today. His diaries, when they were published posthumously, revealed a man rather admiring of Hitler policies in the pre-war years, and one with a very strong and long-lasting antipathy to Winston Churchill.

John Charles Walsham Reith was born in 1889 into a religious family at Stonehaven in Scotland, the youngest of seven children. He studied at Glasgow Academy and at Gresham’s School in Norfolk. He was commissioned into the 5th Scottish Rifles and served in the First World War until he was invalided out in 1915. He spent two years in the US, supervising armament contracts before returning to work for an engineering firm in Glasgow. In 1921, he married Muriel Katharine and they had two children.

Unsatisfied with his lot, Reith moved to London and became secretary to the London Unionist group of MPs in advance of the 1922 general election. Looking around for more ambitious work, he chanced on an advertisement in The Morning Post for a general manager of the British Broadcasting Company, being set up by a consortium of radio manufacturers to produce programmes to be heard on their wireless sets. In time, Reith oversaw the organisation’s transformation under a Royal Charter to the British Broadcasting Corporation; and he became its first Director-General in 1927. Regular television broadcasts began in 1936 just before Reith left the BBC in 1938. In terms of his legacy, he is given considerable credit for having established the tradition of independent public service broadcasting.

After leaving the BBC, Reith served a term as chairman of Imperial Airways. In 1940, he was created Baron Reith of Stonehaven. The same year he was given a government appointment as Minister of Information; and, subsequently, he was elected MP for Southampton. Under Churchill, Reith also served as Minister of Transport and then as First Commissioner of Works. Later, though, he claimed Churchill had not given him enough to do during the war.

In 1946, he was appointed chair of the Commonwealth Telecommunications Board, and other chairmanships followed (Colonial Development Corporation and the National Film Finance Corporation). In later years, Reith held various directorships, was Lord Rector of Glasgow University, and, from 1967, was Lord High Commissioner to the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland. He died on 16 June 1971. Further biographical information is available from the BBC, Wikipedia or Spartacus Educational.

Reith kept a diary for most of his life, amounting to some 4,000 pages, and two million words. Extracts were chosen and edited by Charles Stuart and published in 1975 as The Reith Diaries by Collins.

The book created some media attention at the time because it revealed precisely how Reith, in the 1930s, had been an admirer of the German way of doing things. Stuart says, in his introductory notes, that all Reith’s inclinations were in favour of Germany. On 9 March 1933, for example, Reith wrote: ‘I am pretty certain . . . that the Nazis will clean things up and put Germany on the way to being a real power in Europe again. They are being ruthless and most determined.’ And after the July 1934 Night of The Long Knives, in which the Nazis ruthlessly exterminated their internal dissidents, Reith wrote: ‘I really admire the way Hitler has cleaned up what looked like an incipient revolt.’ After Czechoslovakia was invaded by the Nazis in 1939, he wrote: ‘Hitler continues his magnificent efficiency.’

Stuart, however, suggests that this aspect of Reith’s character was only typical of the times: ‘. . . he combined great self-confidence in the correctness of his opinions with very little sign that he had much knowledge or understanding of the realities of foreign affairs. It was a posture he shared with other leading figures and his attitudes are of more interest as symptoms of the times than illustrative of any great originality on his part.’

The diaries also drew attention to the extraordinary depth of Reith’s hatred for some people, especially Winston Churchill. An article by Ron Robbins, available at The Churchill Centre website, calls the ‘mutual antipathy’ of the two men ‘a strange and somewhat sad chapter in British politics’. He says: ‘Reith’s spleen is written large in his diaries . . . His criticism of Churchill often dribbles on quite absurdly and finally he descends to this: “I absolutely hate him.” But it has to be said that Reith had a remarkably long hate list dating from his early days. Churchill’s genius and magnanimity were beyond Reith’s reach and comprehension. Reith was handicapped by an off-putting, austere nature that contrasted too starkly with Churchill’s warm friendships which had the hallmark of loyalty.’

Here are a few extracts from The Reith Diaries. In the first few, Reith records his involvement in the very earliest days of the BBC; and, in the last two, he reveals how his passion for the very organisation he had nurtured has turned bitter.

13 December 1922
‘This morning I had the interview about the BBC. Sir William Noble [head of the committee selecting a candidate to manage the BBC] came out to get me and he was smiling in a confidential sort of way. Present, McKinistry, Binyon and one other [representatives of the wireless manufacturers]. I put it all before God last night. They didn’t ask me many questions and some they did I didn’t know the meaning of.’ [Note inserted later: ‘The fact is I hadn’t the remotest idea as to what broadcasting was. I hadn’t troubled to find out. If I had tried I should probably have found difficulty in discovering anyone who knew.’] ‘I think they had more or less made up their minds that I was the man before they saw me and that it was chiefly a matter of confirmation. . . They asked what salary I wanted and I said £2,000. Noble came to the door with me and almost winked as if to say it was all right.’

14 December 1922
‘. . . At 3:45 Sir William Noble phoned to ask if I would come along to see him at once, so took a taxi and went. He received me very nicely, . . The Committee had unanimously recommended that I be offered the general managership of the British Broadcasting Co. He said he had tried hard to get the salary of £2,000 but some of the others didn’t want it to start over £1,500, but that if things went OK I should get a rise soon. Later he recommended me to take £1,750 as he thought he could get that approved. After a cup of tea and a general talk, I departed. I am profoundly thankful to God in this matter. It is all His doing. There were six on the short list.’

29 December 1922
‘Newcastle at 12:30. Here I really began my BBC responsibility. Saw transmitting station and studio place and landlords. It was very interesting. Away at 4:28, London at 10:10, bed at 12:00. I am trying to keep in close touch with Christ in all I do and I pray he may keep close to me. I have a great work to do.’

10 September 1923
‘Everything is now in shape for the BBC magazine and from various alternatives I chose Radio Times for the title.’

28 September 1923
‘The first issue of the Radio Times appeared and was sold out.’

19 April 1924
‘Opening of the Wembley Exhibition [British Empire Exhibition]. Everything went most successfully, including the broadcast which went out all over the country, and was the biggest thing we have done yet.’

And 40 years on . . .

30 March 1964
‘I feel immensely sad (and more than that) at the eclipse, or rather complete overthrow and destruction, of all my work in the BBC. It was my being prepared to lead, and to withstand modern laxities and vulgarities and immorality and irreligion and all. No-one was ever in such a position as I; I did what my father and mother would have wished - to universal amazement. All gone. Feeling most melancholy.’

2 April 1964
‘The Dean of Westminster wrote asking me to come to a service on the 19th to signalize the start of the Number Two television BBC. I wouldn’t on any account go to that, nor to anything associated with the BBC.’

This article is a slightly revised version of one first published on 16 June 2011.

Danish flight pioneer

The Danish watchmaker Christian Hansen Ellehammer - born 150 years ago today - is not a name immediately associated with the history of aviation. However, the successful development of an early motorcycle brought him funds to indulge an interest in powered flight. He built the world’s first air-cooled radial engine, and other innovations - the triplane and helicopter - followed. Thanks to a diary-keeping cousin, we have first hand contemporary reports, albeit brief, of key moments in the testing of Ellehammer’s prototypes.

Ellehammer was born on 14 June 1871 in Bakkebølle, Denmark. He was apprenticed as a watchmaker, and then moved to Copenhagen where he worked as an electronics mechanic. In 1898, he established a company to produce electronic machinery. The first of his own successful design/inventions was a motorcycle called the ‘Elleham’ with the engine situated beneath the seating, similar in fact to the Vespa scooter 40 years later. This was a commercial success, and provided him with sufficient funds to experiment with powered flight. 

Using calculations derived from birds, Ellehammer developed an engine lightweight enough to lift himself in the air - this was the world’s first radial engine (with three cylinders). For the wings, he experimented with kites, finally arriving at a shape similar to hang gliders of the future. On 28 August 1906, Ellehammer’s cousin Lars recorded (in an old form of the Danish language) the first successful flight with a brief entry. Translated - and many thanks to Historic Wings for this information - it reads: ‘Tried with Ellehammer on board but without take off. Changed the engine timing with more preignition. Lifted off the ground then with Ellehammer on board we got momentarily off, making it 12 degrees [around the center pole].’

Two weeks later, on 12 September, they were trying again with an 18 hp engine (as opposed to the 9 hp used earlier). Lars’s diary: ‘Wind at 2-3 meters per second. Wind direction northeast.  Flew the whole way around. Hovered with the front and rear wheels [off the ground] traveling approximately [a distance of] 42 meters, reaching an altitude of 1 ½ feet high, as it came up against the [strong] wind.  Ellehammer was on board the whole time.  I took photos of it in flight . . .’

Ellehammer made over 200 flights from 1906 to 1909 in a tethered plane, all without serious accident. Step by step, he increased the engine power and refined the design, developing a monoplane, a semi-biplane and a helicopter. In 1908, he won a prize for an 11 second flight in front of Prince Henry of Prussia but, by this time, he was hearing news of more successful developments taking place in other countries. Nevertheless, he continued inventing, developing a special carburettor, a stationary air-cooled engine for airplanes, and a pump for fire extinguishers. Around 1920, he built a laboratory designed by a new firm of influential Danish architects. He died in 1946. In 1986, he was inducted into the International Air & Space Hall of Fame at the San Diego Air & Space Museum. There is very little biographical information about Ellehammer online in English other than at Wikipedia (see also an English translation of the Danish entry) and Historic Wings.

A Carnap gold mine!

Rudolf Carnap, one of the central figures of 20th century philosophy, was born 130 years ago today. He was the leading exponent of what is called logical positivism or logical empiricism and helped found the idea of a philosophy of science. Born in Germany, he emigrated to the United States in the mid-1930s. Throughout his life he kept shorthand diaries. Recently, many of these have been made freely available online as series of digital images, and some of them have also been transcribed (but only in German). André Carus, an academic philosopher who runs a Carnap blog, has called the diaries ‘a Carnap gold mine!’ None of the diary material, though, has yet appeared in English.

Carnap was born on 18 May 1891 in the small town of Ronsdorf, now part of Wuppertal, an industrial city near the Ruhr area of northwest Germany. His mother was a teacher, and his father owned a ribbon-making factory. He was educated at home before secondary school years, and, in 1908, he moved with his family to Jena, to live with his uncle, Friedrich Wilhelm Dörpfeld, a well-known and highly influential archaeologist. He attended Jena university to study philosophy, physics, and mathematics, and was drawn to Gottlob Frege’s courses in mathematical logic. He was an enthusiastic member of the Youth Movement then sweeping Germany, and became one of its local representatives. Although opposed on moral and political grounds to the war, he felt obliged to serve in the army. After three years he was given permission to study at the University of Berlin (1917-1918) where Albert Einstein was a newly appointed professor. 

Returning to the University of Jena, he wrote a thesis defining an axiomatic theory of space and time but it pleased neither the physics or philosophy departments, so he wrote another on the theory of space in a more orthodox Kantian style. This was published in 1921 as Der Raum (Space). For several years he continued his researches in logic and the foundations of physics and wrote a number of essays on problems of space, time, and causality, as well as a textbook, Abriss der Logistik, on symbolic logic. In 1926, he was invited by Moritz Schlick, the founder of the Vienna Circle to join the faculty of the University of Vienna, where he soon became an influential member. Initial ideas of logical positivism, or logical empiricism emerged from discussions within the Circle, as they sought to develop a scientific world view through bringing the precision of the exact sciences to philosophical inquiry.

Carnap and his associates established close connections with scholars in other countries, among them a group of empiricists in Berlin under Hans Reichenbach. Carnap and Reichenbach founded a periodical, Erkenntnis as a forum for the new ‘scientific philosophy’. In 1928, came Carnap’s first major work Der logische Aufbau der Welt (The Logical Structure of the World). From 1931 to 1935, he was professor of natural philosophy at the German University in Prague, where he developed a more liberal version of empiricism, elaborated in his essay Testability and Meaning.

In 1935, Carnap emigrated to the US (becoming a naturalised citizen in 1941) and took up a post as professor of philosophy at the University of Chicago, where he remained mostly until 1952 (1939-1941 was spent at Harvard University). He wrote books on semantics, modal logic, and on the philosophical foundations of probability and inductive logic. After a stint at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, he joined the UCLA Department of Philosophy in 1954. He worked on scientific knowledge, the analytic–synthetic distinction, and the verification principle. Other writings on thermodynamics, and on the foundations of probability and inductive logic, were published after his death in 1970. He was married twice, having four children by his first marriage to Elizabeth Schöndube, and marrying his second wife, Elizabeth Ina Stöger, in 1933. Further information is available at Wikipedia, Encyclopaedia Britannica, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy or the Internet Encyclopadia of Philosophy.

Carnap kept diaries for much of his life, in German and using a shorthand. They are held with a large collection of other material (donated by Carnap’s daughter in 1974) in the Carnap Papers at the ULS Archives & Special Collections at the University of Pittsburgh. The diaries cover a long period, from 1911 to 1969. A full list is available online with links to the digital images of many, if not most, of the diaries. According to the inventory, transcripts of the diary images are pending and will be put online soon.

Indeed, work has been under way for sometime to produce a working draft of the diaries up to 1935. Brigitta Arden and Brigitte Parakenings have been transcribing them in collaboration with Christian Damböck’s research project Historical-Critical Edition of Sources from the Nachlass of Rudolf Carnap. The initial result is available as a pdf here, but, as the authors state, the text comes with a warning that it must not be cited - there is no introduction, no editorial report, no index of abbreviations, only sketchy annotations, a fragmentary index etc. 

Here is a short bit about the project from an article (entitled Carnap gold mine!) written by André Carus, a philosopher (Munich Centre for Mathematical Philosophy) who runs a Carnap blog,

‘Thanks to Christian Damböck, who has a multi-year grant for this purpose from the Austrian government, Carnap’s diaries (up to 1935) - long inaccessible, and only recently open to the public - have now all been transcribed from Carnap’s Stolze-Schrey shorthand. [. . .] Carnap’s shorthand is not just a standard off-the-shelf system. It is based on Stolze-Schrey, but he used hundreds of personalized abbreviations of his own, which can only be learned by long experience of trial and error. So learning to read it is hard, and I have to admit that even after a lot of practice, I find it slow going. I’ve had a look at some of these diaries in shorthand, and they are often hard to puzzle out. Even with the occasional gap here and there I’m very impressed at the thoroughness and completeness of the job the transcribers have done.’

Purifying penicillin

‘Down to the lab where I saw the Professor [Florey]. He asked me if I would like to help him design apparatus. Naturally I jumped at the opportunity, and he said that he could probably get me a Nuffield grant at £300 p.a. for six months.’ This is from the diary of the British biochemist Norman Heatley on the very day he joined the Oxford University team of scientists who would soon develop a technique for purifying penicillin in large volumes. Heatley, born 110 years ago today, was not among the Nobel prize winners in 1945 for the discovery and development of penicillin, but his diaries testify to the crucial part he played.

Heatley was born in Woodbridge, Suffolk, where, as a boy, he developed a passion for sailing on the local river. At Tonbridge School, he was inspired towards an interest in chemistry, and then biochemistry. After graduating in natural sciences at St John’s College, Cambridge, in 1933 he went on to attain his PhD in 1936. That same year he moved to the University of Oxford, where he became a fellow of Lincoln College and joined a team of scientists tackling the problem of how to manufacture penicillin in usable quantities. The team was led by the Australian pathologist Howard Florey and included Ernst Chain. Heatley, although the junior member, had a gift for ingenuity and invention, and it was he that suggested transferring the active ingredient of penicillin back into water by changing its acidity, thus purifying the penicillin.

In early 1941, the team treated their first patient, a policeman at the Radcliffe Infirmary. His condition improved, but, for lack of enough penicillin, he eventually died. The new drug was then successfully given to children as they required smaller amounts. After failing to get backing from any British pharmaceutical companies, Florey and Heatley flew to the US where a laboratory in Peoria, Illinois, had agreed to work on production of much large volumes of penicillin. Florey soon returned to Oxford but Heatley stayed on as an advisor for another year. Before the end of the war, soldiers were being treated by the new antibiotic, reducing significantly the number of deaths and amputations resulting from infected wounds. 

Heatley returned to Oxford where, in 1944, he married Mercy Bing. They had three sons and two daughters (though one son died in a road crash). He was elected to a newly endowed research fellowship at Lincoln College where he remained for many years. In 1945, Alexander Fleming, Chain and Florey were all awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine ’for the discovery of penicillin and its curative effect in various infectious diseases.’ Heatley’s contribution was not fully recognised for another 45 years, until 1990 when Oxford University awarded him the rare distinction of an honorary Doctorate of Medicine. He died in 2004. Further information is available from Wikipedia, the BBC or obituaries in The Guardian, or The Lancet. 

Heatley’s role in the penicillin story has been described in some detail in two modern books partly thanks to a diary he kept at the time. In 2004, Henry Holt published The Mold in Dr. Florey’s Coat: the story of the penicillin miracle by Eric Lax. Lax says, for example, that ‘Heatley’s diary for October 1939 details his many ideas for and success in assaying penicillin, which was not yet a catchword and whose spelling varied. “Quite encouraging results from the penecillin [sic] testing technique”.’ See also a review of the book in Nature. And in 2012 Viviane Quirke’s Collaboration in the Pharmaceutical Industry - Changing Relationships in Britain and France, 1935–1965 was published by Routledge. A few extracts from Heatley’s diary can be found in both books. 

30 September 1939
‘Down to the lab where I saw the Professor. He asked me if I would like to help him design apparatus. Naturally I jumped at the opportunity, and he said that he could probably get me a Nuffield grant at £300 p.a. for six months.’

31 December 1939
‘What a year! .  . . The latter part of the year I have left research entirely, and have been concentrating on the production of P on a large scale. Now, with the help of George Glister, Ruth Callow, and Claire Inayat we are beginning to grow P nearly one thousand times the scale on which I was growing it a year ago.’

15 June 1940
‘I went to register for National Service after lunch, then worked in the lab until 7 o’clock. Collected a pass from the military authorities in the Old Clarendon, for our lab is to be guarded by the Army after 7.0 pm.’

27 June 1940
‘George and I collected about 40 litres of P solution, and filtered it. In the afternoon tried the dustbin still I had designed, and it worked perfectly, although the cooling condenser was not quite efficient enough.’

7 July 1940
‘Spent the evening making masks of silk, for handling cultures in a sterile way.’

8 July 1940
‘Tried out the first complete apparatus for extraction of P, but it did not seem to work well at all. Began to scheme out of a new idea for suspending wicks or thread in ether, and running aqueous solution down them.’

9 July 1940
‘Spent all day making a new P extractor, on the wick principle. Seemed to work fairly well, but the wicks soon became clogged with mess from the P.’

17 July 1940
‘The whole of one batch of 30 tins was infected, so we discarded it. Set up a new batch of tins. Began to make a new P extracting device. The Professor showed me how to inject mice - he will be away tomorrow and wants me to do it for him then.’

25 July 1940
‘Spent all day playing with the P-extracting apparatus. Gained several useful experiences, and I think it will work quite well eventually.’

What use is it?

‘Dubois nodded proudly. “Ja, Mama, that is the skull. That is Pithecanthropus Erectus.” His mother looked up at him and he saw how much she had aged in eight years. ‘J, Mama, this is it,” he repeated softly, gently. “But boy” - she sighed heavily, looking bewildered at his treasure - “what use is it?” ’ This is a revealing anecdote about Eugène Dubois, a Dutch paleoanthropologist who died 80 years ago today, sourced from the diaries of an assistant. Dubois is remembered today for discovering Java Man, which he claimed was an intermediate form between apes and man. In 2001, he was the subject of a biography by Pat Shipman who notes in her sources that the assistant recorded, in his diary, many conversations with Dubois ‘apparently verbatim’.

Dubois was born in 1858 and raised in Eijsden, at the very southern tip of The Netherlands, close to the Belgian border, where his father was an apothecary, and later the mayor. As a teenager, he attended school in Roermond, boarding with a family there, and went on to study medicine at the University of Amsterdam, graduating in 1884. He married Anna that same year, and they had three children that survived into adulthood. Appointed lecturer in anatomy at the same university in 1886, Dubois spent several years investigating the comparative anatomy of the larynx in vertebrates. But, influenced by Ernst Haeckel, he became increasingly interested in human evolution. 

In 1887, Dubois went to the East Indies as a military surgeon and, on the island of Sumatra, began to excavate caves in search of remains of early hominins. After several futile years, he moved to Java, where a hominid skull had been found. In 1890, his team found a human-like fossil at Koedoeng Broeboes. Dubois excavated the rest of what came to be known as Java Man. Before his return to the Netherlands in 1895, Dubois published his findings, describing them as neither ape nor human but an intermediate species - a position he would stick to through the rest of his life. On the way back, the ship was caught in a storm, he, his family and his fossils barely survived.

Dubois expected that his discovery would be feted in Europe, but instead he found that many scientists refused to accept his analysis. In 1897, he was awarded an honorary doctorate in botany and zoology from the University of Amsterdam, and in 1899 he was appointed professor. Thereafter, he ceased discussing Java Man and hid the fossils away. He spent the next 20 years researching, especially in the study of proportions of brain and body weight. He was also (1897-1928) keeper of paleontology, geology and mineralogy at Teylers Museum. In 1919, he became member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences. It was not until 1923, that Dubois again allowed scientists access to the fossils, which re-ignited the debates over Java Man, especially as his fossils were similar to other newly-found fossils which had been dubbed Peking Man. However, by this time Dubois had become set in his ways, stubborn; he lost his wife and friends. He is said (by Shipman, see below) to have died - on 16 December 1940 - ‘alone, bitter and misunderstood’. Further information is available from Wikipedia, Eugène Dubois Foundation, The TalkOrigins Archive, Strange Science, or The New World Encyclopedia.

More than half a century after his death, Dubois’ somewhat tarnished reputation was given a polish by Pat Shipman, an American professor of anthropology, in her biography: The Man Who Found the Missing Link - The extraordinary life of Eugène Dubois (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2001). Some pages of an American version (Harvard University Press, 2002) can be read at Googlebooks, and a review can be read at Nature. Although Shipman credits - in the after notes - her sources as Dubois’ ‘pocket agendas (a sort of daily calendar), his journals, diaries and notes; and various drafts of brief autobiographies’, it is the diaries of an assistant - Bernsen - that she quotes most often. She says: ‘I relied as well on the diaries of J. J. A. Bernsen, OFM, Dubois’ assistant from 1930 to 1932, in which many conversations with Dubois are recorded apparently verbatim.’ Here are several extracts from Shipman’s book (i.e. her quoting Bernsen, in his diary, quoting Dubois).

13 February 1931
‘[Much later he articulated these feelings.] I always knew that if I could succeed in concentrating my thoughts well on a problem, then I will my true life. Then I am absorbed by the problem. To achieve great things, one must cast aside the unimportant and the sentimental, one must follow truth.’

March 1931
‘Dubois nodded proudly. “Ja, Mama, that is the skull. That is Pithecanthropus Erectus.” His mother looked up at him and he saw how much she had aged in eight years. ‘J, Mama, this is it,” he repeated softly, gently.

“But boy” - she sighed heavily, looking bewildered at his treasure - “what use is it?” ’

2 March 1932
‘I have not published enough. How little I have done about Pithecanthropus,’ [Dubois mourned miserably one day early in March 1931], [ . . ] I have too little ambition and was satisfied as soon as I knew it for myself. After finding the truth, my interest was gone. [. . .]

Only after 1923 did I start to work on Pithecanthropus in earnest and to publish the results, [Dubois continued morosely.] That will be of little account, that the discoverer says so little and so late about a famous find. And then Osborn was pressuring me through the Royal Academy that I should get the work finished and the publication done, so they will say I would never have done it without him and he will get the credit, not me. It has not been enough, what I have said about it. I should have written thick books, like the others who made famous discoveries. My work will be forgotten, overlooked.’

12 May 1932
‘You know, Bernsen, we must talk once more about our relationship. This is all your fault, from the beginning. There is something hostile in you toward me, I have always noticed it. You have repeatedly humiliated me, corrected me, pointed out every error, criticized and questioned my judgements. Even as a small boy I was always treated with special respect. But no, not you, Father, you cannot respect me. You must humiliate me and bring me down out of jealousy at my high position. In recent months I have gone through so much sorrow. It has aged me. I have even wished for the release of death to end this misery. Oh, not that I would commit suicide [. . .] for suicide is cowardly.’

[Bernsen could not contain himself, he was so indignant at being accused of torturing Dubois with his criticisms. ‘Is not the most important thing that the collection be correct? Have you not said this. Professor? Now I see that you are hard and that everything must give way to your interests. I personally mean nothing to you. although for two years I have done the tedious work for the collection, day in and day out. Now I see you differently and my sympathy for you has cooled.’ . . .]

‘Ja, Father, it is true. I am hard in that respect. I have always felt that everything must give way for the goal, everything must be arranged to serve the ends of science. So perhaps I have driven you too hard and given you only criticism, but it is for the collection, for science. I have driven myself as hard, sacrificed as much. Personally, I have always had compassion for you in this tedious work; I find you a good fellow, vou know. Father.’

I was obliged to comfort her

‘Observed a nice looking girl waiting as well as myself so got into conversation with her but was soon interrupted by the arrival of the engine puff, puff, puffing away. Laid hold of her hand took her across the rails to the opposite platform, handed her in and took very good care to sit on the next seat to her. All Right - off she goes - cutting along like a sky rocket. In going through the tunnels the engine fellow set the confounded screeching whistle a going which so terrified my fair companion that I was obliged to put my arm around her waist to comfort her.’ This is Edward Snell, born two centuries ago today, who kept a lively, candid and illustrated diary while working as a young engineer in the West Country. Before he was 30 years old, he emigrated to Australia, where he also kept a diary, and where he made his fortune on the railways.

Snell, the eldest of four children, was born on 27 November 1820, in Barnstaple, Devon, son of a jeweller and clockmaker. When his father died in 1827, his mother was left in financial difficulties, and the family moved to a smaller house in nearby Newport. Thanks to family connections, Snell was able to take up a seven year apprenticeship in Bath as an engineer and millwright with Stothert’s foundry. On completion of his training, he secured a position at the Great Western Railway Company Swindon workshops as head draughtsman, soon rising to deputy works manager. He remained with the company for six years, until a reduction in wages in 1948-1949 (after the British Railway Mania crash) decided him to emigrate to Australia.

Snell spent some time in South Australia surveying and painting, and then gold digging in Castlemaine (where he amassed £341 worth of gold in less than half a year). He married Charlotte Elizabeth Bayley in Geelong in 1853, and they would have nine children. That same year, and for substantial fees, he began to work for the Geelong and Melbourne Railway Company, designing, among other structures, a substantial terminal station and workshops at Geelong. Some of these works were criticised for being flawed, and Snell was called to defend his work in a number of enquires. He also set up several business partnerships, though none lasted very long. He returned to England with his family in 1858, to a life of retirement. He turned to spiritualism in the 1870s, gaining some notoriety in Bath, and died in 1880. Further information is available from Wikipedia.

Snell is largely remembered today for two diaries, both profusely illustrated with pen and ink sketches, that he kept, one during his early working life (after the apprenticeship) from 1842 to 1849, and the other while he was in Australia, 1849-1858. The first is (or was in 2002) in the possession of Snell’s great grand-daughter; the second was purchased in 1935 by the State Library of Victoria, Melbourne, from a book dealer in Exeter. Only the Australia diary has been published - by Australian publisher Angus & Robertson in 1989 as The Life and Adventures of Edward Snell: The illustrated diary of an artist, engineer and adventurer in the Australian colonies 1849 to 1859 (edited and introduced by Tom Griffiths).

Unfortunately, I have not been able to source any extracts from The Life and Adventures; but, online, I have found a few extracts form the Australia diary. In 2002, the Bath History journal (Volume IX) published Edward Snell’s Diary: A Journeyman Engineer in Bath in the 1840s written by John Cattell (I think, but I’m not certain, that this must be the National Head of Research at Historic England - see here). Cattell starts off his essay as follows: ‘Edward Snell is a relatively obscure figure who is best known in this country for his two watercolour views of the new locomotive works and railway village in Swindon in 1849. But he was so much more - engine, erector, civil engineer, surveyor, draughtsman, inventor, artist, traveller and adventurer. His greatest contribution to posterity; perhaps, was as a diarist and chronicler of the social scene in England and subsequently in Australia.’

And here is Cattell’s concluding paragraph: ‘Snell’s English diary offers fresh insights into the true nature of life for many of Bath’s inhabitants in the 1840s. His account of a busy working life is strikingly at odds with the usual descriptions of genteel Bath society, and reflects the changing nature of the city at that time. It puts flesh on the bones of the histories of the period in a way that amounts to a veritable goldmine for the social historian. Above all it is the personal and highly entertaining story of an articulate young artisan eager to make his way in the world. That it is told with wry humour and illustrated by such amusing sketches, at times approaching caricature, only adds to its appeal.’

The essay continues with much detail and diagrams from the diary, and also a few extracts. It is worth noting that Cattell wrote at the time, i.e. in 2002, that he was editing Snell’s first diary for publication - but I’ve found no trace of any such publication. Here are some extracts from Snell’s diary as found in Cattell’s essay. (My use of ‘Undated’ signifies that there is no date given in Cattell’s essay for that entry.)

14 April 1842
’Staid at home all evening reading. Zenas Hall came in slightly fuddled and began to show symptoms of a scrimmage - but the effervescence of his spirits soon passed off and he sat down quietly playing his flute till bedtime ... [When] Zenas ... staggered into the room this evening ... the first indication of his not being  compis mentis  was communicated to me in the shape of a punch on the head. Owing however to the difficulty he experienced in preserving his centre of gravity the said ‘punch’ was no more than a love tap and did not in the least ruffle my truly amiable temper.’

Undated
’Miss B[rooke] desired me to brew myself a glass of whiskey and water and as I was not aware of the strength of the ‘cratur’ I mixed a jolly good tumbler of half and half swallowed it and soon found myself unable to preserve my centre of gravity and as great as a lord in my estimation. Can’t very distinctly remember all the little absurdities I was guilty of. I had a notion of trying to walk in a straight line from one lamp post to another but I have a strong suspicion that I did not succeed. I have likewise a faint recollection of making love to Mrs Coopey, attempting to preach a sermon, then spouting Richard the 3rd, singing a Psalm & then toddling up stairs to bed with a great many injunctions from Mrs Coopey to be sure & take care of the candle and not set any thing on fire.’

Undated
‘Went home to bed - found it plaguey hot & wanted to sleep with the window open but Hall wouldn’t consent to it so I took up my quarters on the outside of the bed and kept Hall awake by chattering till he got so savage I thought it dangerous to persist so in compliance with his advice I ‘shut my head and went to sleep’.

26 December 1844
’We met at Mr HS [Snell’s shorthand for Henry Stothert] the same company we saw the night before with the addition of Mr Laufiere & Mr & Mrs William Stothert & family. Spent the evening gloriously - every delicacy of the Season - beautiful girls, music, dancing, etc. Obliged to leave them at 12 tho. Went into the Full Moon with Mr Laufiere & Mr Pitt & had a glass of brandy & water & cigar.’

Undated
‘This morning old Bluebottle came up into the pattern shop grumbling about our shutting the door and trigged it open himself, but had barely reached the bottom of the ladder before it was shut again, by that fountain of all mischief Bill Glass. This contempt of his authority acted upon old Bluebottle’s excitable temper to such a degree that he was constrained to blow off steam, which he immediately did in the shape of a volley of oaths and imprecations quite dismal & heartrending to listen to, but we excused it as we thought without a vent of some kind he must inevitably have burst his boiler. When the tempest of his wrath had in some degree subsided, he mildly swore by God he’d have the door off the hinges, which was accordingly done by old Sam Hook, so that the pattern shop is now most admirably ventilated, though unfortunately instead of pure air of heaven, ‘wot poets call zephyr breeze’ the Sulphuric vapour from the furnace finds it way into the shop, and by half suffocating the unfortunate inmates gives them a slight foretaste of what they may expect in the next world, when consigned to the tender mercies of the gentleman whose name should never be mentioned in the hearing of ‘Ears polite’.’

22 April [?]
’. . . to see Miss Ellis & found she was out. This is probably the last time I shall ever see her as she leaves Bath for Glamorganshire tomorrow & will not return till the winter, & before that time I shall, I expect, have quitted Bath for London.’

24 April [?]
‘In the afternoon took a walk with a Miss [Susan] Thomthwaite to Sham Castle where she left me to flirt with a tailor and 2 counterjumpers and if I had any regard for her I should have taken offence at it. As it was it made me look rather silly and I’ll warrant I don’t walk her out again for some time to come ... After Chaple [sic] took a walk with Miss Ellis and after I left her took another with Henrietta.’

Undated
>‘While there observed a nice looking girl waiting as well as myself so got into conversation with her but was soon interrupted by the arrival of the engine puff, puff, puffing away. Laid hold of her hand took her across the rails to the opposite platform, handed her in and took very good care to sit on the next seat to her. All Right - off she goes - cutting along like a sky rocket. In going through the tunnels the engine fellow set the confounded screeching whistle a going which so terrified my fair companion that I was obliged to put my arm around her waist to comfort her and being in total darkness thought there could be no harm in giving her a kiss or two but the tunnel was so confoundedly long at Brislington that by Jove I could hardly make a hundred last all the way through.’

The ‘canali’ of Mars

Giovanni Virginio Schiaparelli, the Italian astronomer, died one hundred and ten years ago today. He is particularly remembered for his observations and descriptions of the planet Mars, as well as for his studies of ancient astronomy. He kept diaries, mostly scientific, for some of his working life, often illustrating them, and, although not published, they have been used as a primary source for some astronomy history papers.

Schiaparelli was born in Savigliano, northern Italy, in 1835. He graduated in engineering from the University of Turin in 1854, and, with the help of influential friends, went on to study and research astronomy at Berlin Observatory under Johann Franz Encke, and at Pulkovo Observatory near St Petersburg. Returning to Italy in 1860, he was appointed second astronomer at the Brera Astronomical Observatory, in Milan, becoming its director in 1862, and remaining so for the best part of 40 years. He married Maria Comotti in 1865, and together they parented five children. His first discovery at Brera, in 1861, was the asteroid Hesperia. This was followed in 1886 by the discovery of a connection between the orbits of comets and meteors (for which he was awarded he Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society in 1872).

In 1875, with a new refractor telescope, Schiaparelli began measurements of double stars, and then, from 1877, during the Mars opposition that year (when Mars is closest to Earth), he launched a long and ultimately important series of observations of the planet over a 20 year period (benefiting from a new telescope and rebuilt dome in 1885). His work was published in several papers by Reale Accademia dei Lincei (of which he was a member) together amounting to the then most detailed monograph on the physical appearance of Mars. In 1893, he published his main work on the subject, La vita sul pianeta Marte (Life on Mars). Interestingly, when he first described (and illustrated - see photo of stamp) a dense network of linear structures that he had found on the surface of the planet, he called them ‘canali’ or channels, but the word was mis-translated in English as ‘canals’ - i.e. artificial constructions. The mistake led to a wave of popular theories about potential life on Mars which carried on through the first half of the 20th century.

Schiaparelli was also a senator of the Kingdom of Italy. After his retirement, he studied the astronomy of the ancient Hebrews and Babylonians and wrote L’astronomia nell’antico testamento, 1903 (Astronomy in the Old Testament). He died on 4 July 1910. Further information is available from Wikipedia, Osservatorio Astronimoco di Brera, Encyclopaedia Britannica, a biography in the Journal of the British Astronomical Association (available at Astrophysics Data System), or David Darling’s website.

There is not much information in English about Schiaparelli’s diaries online, other than a 2011 paper on The Diary of Schiaparelli in Berlin (26 October 1857-10 May 1859): a guide for future scientific activity by P. Tucci. This can be found online at the Journal of the Italian Astronomical Society. According to Tucci, ‘the diary is very important for the reconstruction of Schiaparelli’s training as an astronomer.’ He goes on: ‘The Diary is written in a nice calligraphy, especially the section on the lectures of the winter semester 1857-’58. The Diary contains a wealth of relevant information on the training of the young scientist and the emergence of the wide spectrum of interests. The first part is basically focused on a detailed account of the first semester of the academic year 1857-’58. Almost every lesson is told with great details and the writing is probably a transcript of notes taken during the lesson. Over the months, however, more space is gradually won over by the tale of personal stories and unfolding of episodes of common everyday life, all at the expense of the University lectures.’ Tucci’s paper focuses on astronomy rather than the ‘personal stories’.

Here is an extract from Tucci’s analysis of Schiaparelli’s diary: ‘With the beginning of 1858. Giovanni Virginio began to attend the Berlin Observatory, headed by Encke. It’s firstly quoted in Friday. January 8. when he claims: “I went to the Observatory to find Encke, and gave him the reduction of the observations made on last 8 September of which he was very happy”. After being in the library, Giovanni Virginio came back again to the Observatory, where he was able to observe “. . . quite well at the meridian passage of the Sun”; he also took the opportunity “. . . to see in a very clear way how the Sun is able to change the shape of the instruments.” Also Sunday, 17 Giovanni Virginio “. . . went to the Observatory, first to observe the Sun at noon, then in the evening, where in spite of fresh air I gathered a harvest of at least 24 passages. It’s strange that the Observatory was empty, and no one observed except me. Is this a work of slaves?” ’

Another 2011 paper on Schiaparelli and his legacy, by A. Manara and G. Trinchieri, includes several images (illustrations and texts) from the diaries - as shown here. The manuscript diaries are held in the archives at the Brera Observatory.

A boiling cauldron

‘This is nothing like I had ever seen. It was much worse than any photographs of the face of the moon. It looked like a boiling cauldron, because large icebergs the size of houses from the glaciers on the mountain were buried underneath hot ash and lava. The icebergs were melting and the surface of the ash was caving in.’  This is President Jimmy Carter writing in his diary about a visit to the aftermath of the Mount St. Helens volcanic eruptions - the most disastrous such eruptions in US history. The volcanic activity had started two months earlier and culminated in a destructive earthquake on 18 May 1980 - 40 years ago today. Although Carter had always declined requests to publish his diary record of the visit to Mount St. Helens, he agreed, finally, to let journalist Jim Erickson include it in his just-published book: Memories of Mount St. Helens.

Mount St. Helens was formed about 275,000 years ago and has been the most active volcano in the Cascade Range, northwest US, during the Holocene (roughly the last 12,000 years of Earth’s history). Historical eruptions in the 19th century were witnessed by early settlers. Prior to 1980, the mountain had the shape of a conical, youthful volcano sometimes referred to as the Mount Fuji of America. But on 27 March 1980 and thereafter, it suffered a series of volcanic explosions, culminating on 18 May with a major explosive eruption. The upper 400 m of the summit was removed by a huge debris avalanche, leaving a horseshoe-shaped crater now partially filled by a lava dome and a glacier.

Some 57 people as well as thousands of animals were killed directly, hundreds of square miles were reduced to wasteland, and damage was calculated at over $1 billion - it was the most disastrous volcanic eruption in US history. Subsequently, the US Forest Service took over control of the area, which has been preserved, in an unaltered state, as the Mount St. Helens National Volcanic Monument. Further information can be found at Wikipedia, USGS, and Encyclopaedia Britannica.

Four days after the catastrophic event, President Jimmy Carter visited the site, and he wrote about the visit at some lengthy in his diary. Since then, and over the decades, he refused repeated requests to publish his account. Only now - forty years after the eruption - has he made the unedited diary entry public. Here is journalist Jim Erikson - who said the eruption was the biggest story he ever covered - explaining how access to Carter’s diary entry inspired him to complete a book about the volcano:

‘In January 2019, I began reading clips of my stories from the Tacoma News Tribune, as well as other volcano articles from the Oregonian and the Columbian, the only newspapers I had access to during the weeks I spent in Vancouver, Washington, with geologists. In February I wrote a letter to President Carter in Plains, Georgia, including a copy of my story about his visit to the volcano to establish my credibility. My request was for his memories. After a month and a half, Carter did respond, giving me permission to use his diary entry for the day of his 1980 visit. I was elated. It inspired me to contact all the other people I interviewed for my book. I collected photos to augment the book and was pleased when The History Press accepted my proposal.’

Memories of Mount St. Helens was published by The History Press in March 2020; some pages can be previewed at Googlebooks. Here is the publisher’s blurb: ‘In the spring of 1980, Mount St. Helens awoke from a century-long slumber with a series of dramatic changes. Most threatening was a bulge on the side of the snowy peak, pushing steadily outward. Near Spirit Lake, local resident Harry Truman refused to leave his lodge, even as scientists like David Johnston warned about potential destruction. On May 18, the mountain finally blew, enveloping whole communities in ash and smoke. Mudflows destroyed bridges, houses and highways, and fifty-seven people, including Truman and Johnston, lost their lives. Today, the mountain is quiet. Plants and animals have returned and hiking trails have been rebuilt, but the scars remain. Join author and journalist Jim Erickson as he recounts the unforgettable saga of the Mount St. Helens eruption.’

And here is Carter’s diary entry. (In fact, an edited version of this diary entry appears in Carter’s own published work: White House Diary - see Googlebooks. Also, see the online version of Carter’s ‘Presidential Daily Diary’ for 22 May 1980 here.)

22 May 1980
‘In the morning, about 5:30, we ran 3 miles or so. And then took helicopters. Went down the Columbia River to the Kelso area where the Toutle and Cowlitz Rivers dump into the Columbia. The surge of ash carried by the rivers had clogged up the Columbia ship channel from a depth of 40 feet down to only 12 feet. We are moving hopper dredges in there as quickly as possible to get the channel opened up because a number of ships are trapped in the Portland harbor and need to get a load of cargo out.

We then went up to Toutle Valley in the helicopter - first seeing large quantities of white-looking ash. And in the narrow river valley, we eventually began to see where the blast had directly burned the trees. Fifteen miles from the volcano, the trees had been burnt instantaneously with power at least equivalent to a 10-megaton nuclear explosion. The blast that followed in a few minutes had leveled every tree in an area of 150 square miles. One cubic mile off the side of the mountain had been pulverized, most of it into ash the consistency of face powder. Less than one micron in particle size. This ash had flowed down the mountain, carrying large chunks of ice, and also large rocks and molten lava.

Spirit Lake, the head of the Toutle River, was filled with 400 feet of ash and lava. The level of it had been raised 150 to 200 feet. And there was a dam 12 miles long below the lake.

This is nothing like I had ever seen. It was much worse than any photographs of the face of the moon. It looked like a boiling cauldron, because large icebergs the size of houses from the glaciers on the mountain were buried underneath hot ash and lava. The icebergs were melting and the surface of the ash was caving in.

The steam from the melting ice was rising. There were a few fires visible, but there was nothing much left to burn.

Eighty-five or 90 people were either dead or missing, including, unfortunately, some geologists who were handling the seismograph stations and instruments to assess the mountain’s volcanic activity before it erupted.

The top 1,200 feet of the mountain was missing.

We couldn’t get all the way to the mountain because of heavy steam and cloud formations. When the helicopter pilot decided to turn around, he didn’t get any argument from me.

After a press conference [in Portland], we went to Spokane. Although they only had about a half-inch deposit of ash, being 250 miles away their airport was closed [it remained so for twenty-two days] because this extremely fine powder couldn’t be controlled and was suspended in the air. 

At other places around Yakima and Ritzville the ash was as deep as 4 or 5 inches, and they’re still not able to shovel their way out through this fine powder which has a specific gravity of about 2.7. It is non-toxic, and will ultimately be incorporated into the soil or on the bottom of lakes and streams, or carried out to sea.

Frank Press [Carter’s science advisor] says this is by far the biggest natural explosion ever recorded in North America in the last 4,000 years.

Only because the volcano was very closely monitored, was the loss of life restricted. And, of course, it is in an isolated area, as well.

My inclination is not to clean up anything we don’t have to, that’s not directly effecting human life, but to let nature take its course in the valley region and around the mountain, which has a completely different geological configuration now.’