JF Ptak Science Books    Quick Post

This title, drawn from the identifier of an illustration from Scientific American (for September 13, 1890), I think would be a great way of teaching sci/tech principles, using stuff from your desk or hallway etc to illustrate the scientific method and to see how “science” can be found in  Real Life.   Of course this was from an era in which books like Ganot’s Physics would instruct not only on the principles of a pump but how to fix it as well–and also how to make the hardware like the nuts and bolts that you needed for the fix-up, and so on.  In general Scientific American was great for this sort of thing–these were the additional bits to the scientific news and drama of the week, the recipes on how to make the blackest ink and other such potentially useful recipes.  

I’ve included this illustration because of the <sigh> requirements necessary to see what has been lost in scientific education at the elementary levels, and also due to its high/found artistic qualities.  It also looks like a puzzle, but isn’t.