JF Ptak Science Books   Quick Post    

I found this lovely little article in the not-terribly-common Natural Science for April 1896 while looking for an article on the nearly still brand-new discovery of X-rays. “Natural Science” was really more like natural philosophy than the biological stuff, as a quick breeze through any of its volumes shows, though there is plenty of high-Victorian interest in all aspects of living sciences found here. What was so interesting about the horizontal pendulum was how the author (C.Davison of “King Edward’s High School, Birmingham”) traced down its history of having been independently discovered (and forgotten) “no less than eight times within a period of sixty years”. As with other inventions that were “in the air” (like the telephone, and the electric telegraph, and the television, and so on, where a number of people were working independently at the same time) the horizontal pendulum was that too–except that the process of discovery continued for quite a long time.  

I don’t mean to go into this at all–I just liked the wonderful research and presentation in this little five-page article.  And for anyone who cares, C. Daivson’s (not C. Davisson as in Daivsson and Germer) references are included below.