Experimental Spaces and the Knowledge Economy

Hume David , “Of refinement in the arts” (1741–42), quoted in Roy Porter , Enlightenment: Britain and the creation of the modern world (London, 2000), 201.

Quoted in Hacking Ian , Representing and intervening: Introductory topics in the philosophy of natural science (Cambridge, 1983), 152–3; see also Hacking , The emergence of probability: A philosophical study of early ideas about probability, induction and statistical inference (Cambridge, 1975), 35–36. Cf. Crosland Maurice , “Early laboratories c. 1600 — C. 1800 and the location of experimental science”, Annals of science, lxii (2005), 2005–53; and Hill C. R. , “The iconography of the laboratory”, Ambix, xxii (1973), 1973–10.

Mokyr Joel , The gifts of Athena: Historical origins of the knowledge economy (Princeton and Oxford, 2002), 29.

Mokyr , The gifts of Athena (ref. 3), 71.

Coleby L. J. M. , “John Hadley, Fourth Professor of Chemistry in the University of Cambridge”, Annals of science, viii (1952), 293–301, p. 294. On Cambridge and chemistry see Schaffer Simon Stewart Larry , “Vigani and after: Chemical enterprise in Cambridge 1680–1780”, and Russell Colin , “Richard Watson: Gaiters and gunpowder” in Archer Mary Haley Christopher (eds), The 1702 Chair of Chemistry at Cambridge: Transformation and change (Cambridge and New York, 2005), 31–56, 57–83.

Trinity College, Cambridge, Wren Library, John Hadley, MS “Introduction to chemistry”, fols. 13–14; quoted in Coleby , “John Hadley” (ref. 5), 297.

Coleby , “John Hadley” (ref. 5), 296.

Gascoigne John , Cambridge in the Age of the Enlightenment (Cambridge, 1989), 288–9.

Watson Richard , Chemical essays (5 vols, Cambridge, 1781–87), ii, 39–40; Musson A. E. Robinson Eric , Science and technology in the industrial revolution (Toronto, 1969), 167–70; Coleby L. J. M. , “John Mickleburgh: Professor of Chemistry at the University of Cambridge, 1718–56”, Annals of science, viii (1952), 1952–74, p. 165.

Cf. Fox Robert , “Diversity and diffusion: The transfer of technologies in the industrial age”, Transactions of the Newcomen Society, lxx (1998–99), 185–96, p. 186.

Quoted in Musson Robinson , Science and technology in the industrial revolution (ref. 9), 136.

Mokyr , The gifts of Athena (ref. 3), 291.

See Stewart Larry Weindling Paul , “Philosophical threads: Natural philosophy and public experiment among the weavers of Spitalfields”, The British journal for the history of science, xxviii (1995), 37–62.

See the biography of Williams John , in Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, xxxv (1875), 180–3.

Mokyr , The gifts of Athena (ref. 3), 77.

Josiah Wedgwood to Bentley Thomas , 1766, in Letters of Josiah Wedgwood, 1762–1772 (London, 1903), 165; quoted in Jacob Margaret C. , Scientific culture and the making of the industrial West (New York, 1997), 10–11.

Birmingham Central Library [hereinafter BCL], James Watt Papers [hereinafter JWP] 6/36/37. Watt to Wedgwood, 28 January 1784.

Conservatoire des Arts et Métiers, Paris, MS U 216. Le Turc to Citoyen, 14 Nivoise An 3 [1794]; in Jacob , Scientific culture (ref. 16), 165. Reference from the late Professor J. R. Harris.

Mokyr , The gifts of Athena (ref. 3), 179.

See the remarkable reply to A. Rupert Hall on this issue by Musson A. E. , in a review of McKendrick Neil (ed.), Historical perspectives, in Minerva, xiii (1975), 633–7.

BCL, JWP 4/65/19. Watt to Thomas Percival, 24 November 1794. My italics.

BCL, JWP 4/12/40. James Watt to Joseph Black, 13 August 1786. On James Watt's chemical interests see Hills Richard L. , “James Watt and bleaching”, in Fox Robert Nieto-Galan Agusti (eds), Natural dyestuffs and industrial culture in Europe (Canton, MA, 1999), 259–82.

BCL, JWP W/6/3. James Watt, Jr, to his father, 20 May 1793.

Schaffer Simon , “Measuring virtue: Eudiometry, enlightenment and pneumatic medicine”, in Cunningham Andrew French Roger (eds), The medical enlightenment of the eighteenth century (Cambridge and New York, 1990), 281–318, pp. 285ff.

BCL, JWP 4/65/4. Thomas Beddoes to James Watt, 29 May 1799.

Cf. Gooding David , “History in the laboratory: Can we tell what really went on?”, in James Frank A. J. L. (ed.), The development of the laboratory: Essays on the price of experiment in industrial civilization (New York, 1989), 64–67.

See Gibbs F. W. , “Robert Dossie, 1717–1777 and the Society of Arts”, Annals of science, vii (1951), 149–72, esp. pp. 150–1.

Gibbs F. W. , “William Lewis, M.D., F.R.S. (1706–1781)”, Annals of science, viii (1952), 122–51, p. 124. Quoting The Daily Post, 11 January 1737.

Gibbs , “William Lewis” (ref. 28), 126–7. Cf. Lewis William , A course of practical chemistry. In which are contained all the operations described in Wilson's complete course of chemistry (London, 1746).

Gibbs , “William Lewis” (ref. 28), 136–7; Gibbs , “Robert Dossie” (ref. 27), 162.

Gibbs , “Robert Dossie” (ref. 27), 152–3. See also Stewart Larry , “Putting on airs: Science, medicine and polity in the late eighteenth century”, in Levere Trevor Turner Gerard L'E. (eds), Discussing chemistry and steam: The minutes of a coffee house philosophical society 1780–1787 (Oxford and New York, 2002), 207–55, pp. 222, 230.

Quoted in Gibbs , “Robert Dossie” (ref. 27), 154–5.

Royal Society of Arts, Subscription book, 1754–63.

Royal Society of Arts, Minutes of Committees, 1763–64, RE/GE/112/12/5. Chemistry, pp. 10–21 (August 1763).

Royal Society of Arts, Premiums offered by the Society, PR/GE/112/13/4 (1767), p. 17, no. 96.

Cf. Hacking , Representing and intervening (ref. 2), 150–1.

Gibbs , “William Lewis” (ref. 28), 132–3.

Gibbs , “William Lewis” (ref. 28), 130, 140–2.

Musson Robinson , Science and technology in the industrial revolution (ref. 9), 53–54, 78.

There has been some confusion over the extent to which surviving notebooks in the Wedgwood MSS were really Wedgwood's or those of Chisholm and/or Lewis. This can be resolved only through a systematic analysis of the handwriting and it cannot be ruled out that some of these reports have been divided, re-bound and almost certainly added to over the years of Chisholm's employ with Wedgwood.

Quoted in Gibbs F. W. , “A notebook of William Lewis and Alexander Chisholm”, Annals of science, viii (1952), 202–20, esp. p. 205. My italics.

British Library, Add. MS. 28314. Josiah Wedgwood MS. Collection, viii, 73.

Gibbs , “Notebook” (ref. 41), 203, 209.

Gibbs , “Notebook” (ref. 41), 202–20; and Gibbs , “William Lewis” (ref. 28), 122–51, passim.

Keele University, Wedgwood MSS., E26–19122, esp. p. 53. Wedgwood references by courtesy of the Trustees of the Wedgwood Museum, Staffordshire. On Bentley see Dolan Brian , Josiah Wedgwood: Entrepreneur to the Enlightenment (London and New York, 2005); and Oxford dictionary of national biography (Oxford, 2004) [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/2175].

Keele University, Wedgwood—Bentley letters, ii, 15. Josiah Wedgwood to Thomas Bentley, 2 March 1767.

Keele University, Wedgwood—Bentley letters, v, 129. Josiah Wedgwood to Thomas Bentley, 13 October 1771; and v, 165, Wedgwood to Bentley, 30 November 1771.

Keele University, Wedgwood MSS. E25/18628. Matthew Horne to Thomas Bentley, 1775.

Keele University, Wedgwood Moseley collection [hereinafter WM], WM 18, Chisholm to Josiah Wedgwood, 11 January 1787; Wedgwood MSS. E4, 3322 [a copy], Josiah Wedgwood, Jr, to James Watt [Jr], 30 March 1800.

Keele University, WM 1506. Priestley to Cox, 2 June 1784. On Cox see Dolan Brian , Wedgwood: The first tycoon (New York and London, 2004), passim; and Dolan , Josiah Wedgwood (ref. 45).

Keele University, Wedgwood MSS, E3, 2126. Chisholm to Rev. Thomas Gisborne, 11 April 1783. See “Gisborne, Thomas (1758–1846)”, Oxford dictionary of national biography (Oxford, 2004) [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/10782].

Keele University, Wedgwood MSS, L26, 4427–4432A, 1786–87.

Keele University, Wedgwood MSS, L101, 18758. Nairne & Blunt to Wedgwood, 17 June 1783.

Keele University, WM 1507, James Watt to Wedgwood, 6 April 1784.

BCL, JWP 4/12/40. Watt to Black, 13 August 1786.

BCL, JWP, C1/15. Watt to Lind, 21 September 1783 and 26 December 1784.

Priestley to Matthew Boulton, n.d., 1777, in Schofield Robert E. , A scientific autobiography of Joseph Priestley (Cambridge, MA, and London, 1966), 161–2. See also Schaffer , “Measuring virtue” (ref. 24), 290–1.

James Watt to Joseph Black, 13 December 1782, quoted in Miller David Philip , Discovering water: James Watt, Henry Cavendish and the nineteenth-century ‘water controversy’ (Aldershot and Burlington, 2004), 52. My italics.

BCL, JWP 4/12/46. Watt to Black, 3 February 1783.

BCL, JWP 4/12/44. Watt to Black, 25 September 1783.

Watt James , “Thoughts on the constituent parts of water and of dephlogisticated air; with an account of some experiments on that subject. In a letter from Mr. James Watt, Engineer, to Mr. De Luc, F.R.S.”, Philosophical transactions, lxxiv (1784), 329–53. Cf. Miller , Discovering water (ref. 58), 52–53.

Miller , Discovering water (ref. 58), 62–63.

James Watt to Joseph Fry, 15 May 1784. Quoted in Uglow Jenny , The Lunar men: Five friends whose curiosity changed the world (New York, 2002), 360.

BCL, JWP 4/59/7. Watt to William Small?, 20 October 1769. On Keir see Moilliet J. L. Smith Barbara M. D. , A mighty chemist: James Keir of the Lunar Society (privately printed, 1962).

Keele University, Wedgwood MSS. E1–697, James Keir to Thomas Wedgwood, 19 April 1792.

Keele University, Wedgwood MSS. E1–698, James Keir to Thomas Wedgwood, 26 December 1787.

Keele University, Wedgwood MSS. E1–692, James Keir to Thomas Wedgwood, 27 October 1791.

Imperial College & Science Museum Library, London. Recipe book of Robert Harrison, MS. 449, vol. ii, esp. pp. 75ff. On Galton see Uglow , The Lunar men (ref. 63), 352.

Quoted in Miller , Discovering water (ref. 58), 91.

BCL, JWP, 4/13/23. Possibly Daniel Parker? Coke to Watt, 25 March 1792.

Cornwall Record Office, Davies Gilbert correspondence. DG41/48/2. Thomas Beddoes to Davies Gilbert (Giddy), 21 November? 1791; Moilliet J. L. , “Keir's ‘Dialogues on chemistry’ — An unpublished masterpiece”, Chemistry and industry, 19 December 1964, 2081–3.

Keele University, WM 1506. Priestley to Mr. Cox at Josiah Wedgwood's, 2 June 1784; WM 1507, James Watt to Wedgwood, 6 April 1784.

Keele University, WM 1111. Wedgwood to Lavoisier, 19 August and 7 August 1791 (copies).

Cf. Levere Turner , Discussing chemistry and steam (ref. 31), passim.

Mokyr , The gifts of Athena (ref. 3), 24.

Stewart L. , “The boast of Matthew Boulton: Energy, innovation and projectors in the Industrial Revolution”, in Economia e energia Secc. XIII—XVIII. Instituto Internazionale di Storia Economica ‘F. Datini’ (Prato, 2003), 993–1010.

Quoted in Dickinson H. W. Jenkins R. , James Watt and the steam engine (1927; repr. London, 1989), 355–6.

Cf. Dickinson Jenkins , James Watt (ref. 76), 5, 354.

BCL, JWP, Parcel E. James Watt, Jr, to his father, 24 September 1795.

BCL, Matthew Boulton Papers, 254. Boulton-Watt to James Cooper, 23 November 1792.

BCL, JWP, Box 38/3. James Watt, Jr, to Matthew Robinson Boulton, 11 February 1796.

Ibid.

BCL, JWP 4/65/13. Thomas Henry to Watt, 6 December 1794; 4/65/14. Henry to Watt, 16 April 1795. See also Farrar W. V. Farrar Kathleen R. Scott E. L. , “Thomas Henry (1734–1816)”, and Farrar W. V. Farrar Kathleen R. Scott E. L. , “Thomas Henry's sons: Thomas, Peter and William”, in Farrar William Vernon , Chemistry and the chemical industry in the 19th century: The Henrys of Manchester and other studies, ed. by Hills Richard L. Brock W. H. (Aldershot and Brookfield, 1997), chaps. 1 and 2.

BCL, JWP 6/35/39. Jn. Bouby to Watt, 7 December 1797; JWP 6/35/32. William Henry to Watt, 15 December 1798. On William see esp. Farrar W. V. Farrar K. R. Scott , “Thomas Henry's sons”, op. cit. (ref. 83), and idem, “William Henry and John Dalton”, ibid., chap. 3.

See Keele University, Wedgwood MSS. L26–4440, Thos and Wm. Henry to Wedgwood and Byerley, 20 December, 1800; idem, L26–4441, 2 February 1801; L26–4442, William Henry to Thos. Byerley, 26 September 1801; L26–4444, William Henry to Wedgwood and Byerley, 9 December 1802.

BCL, JWP, C1/16. Thomas Henry to Watt, 28 December 1794.

Keele University, WM 35. Beddoes to Thomas Wedgwood, 22 February 1795? Cf. Levere Trevor H. , “Dr. Thomas Beddoes: The interaction of pneumatic and preventive medicine with chemistry”, Interdisciplinary science reviews, vii (1982), 137–47.

BCL, JWP, 4/65/6. Erasmus Darwin to Watt, 29 April 1795.

See here the foreword by Margaret Jacob to the reprint of Musson Robinson , Science and technology in the industrial revolution (London, 1989).

BCL, JWP 4/65/19. Watt to Thomas Percival, 22 November 1794.

Mokyr , The gifts of Athena (ref. 3), 286.

Mokyr , The gifts of Athena (ref. 3), 139.

Mokyr , The gifts of Athena (ref. 3), 194.