“The King George III Collection” at the Science Museum

Abstract

Exhibit Reviews ‘THE KING GEORGE III COLLECTION” AT THE SCIENCE MUSEUM LARRY STEWART Historians of technology and science have sometimes paid insufficient attention to the material and the artifactual. Captive of documents and memoirs and impatient with the static displays of museums designed primarily to glorify, historians had litde motivation to pay attention to the efforts of museology. It is, therefore, particularly striking that both the Science Museum and the Museum of London recendy sponsored seminars and conferences on the importance of the skilled trades and the material evidence they left behind. Most remarkable of all is the opening in November 1993 of an exhibition featuring the King George III collection of scientific instruments, most not seen by the public in more than a decade. The curators, Alan Morton and Jane Wess, have produced a superb permanent display at the Science Museum. Much of the collection exhibited consists of instruments commis­ sioned by George III that passed down through the royal family to King’s College and ultimately into the possession of the Science Museum in 1927. A number of other pieces in this vast array ofapparatus came from Stephen Demainbray, one of the most important public lecturers of the mid-18th century, who ultimately was patronized by Lord Bute and George III. These materials afford us a wonderful view, not only of the achievements of instrument makers like George Adams, but also of the nature of devices that were used to make science accessible to the 18th-century public. This display of a collection once designed to reveal scientific prin­ ciples to the curious is now, in a museum with a mandate to make science accessible, serving that purpose again, with the additional task of making clear to historians of technology and science the manner in which such knowledge was once delivered. No small part of the message Dr. Stewart is associate professor in the Department of History at the University of Saskatchewan. He is the author of The Rise ofPublic Science, Rhetoric, Technology and Natural Philosophy, 1660-1750 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992).© 1994 by the Society for the History of Technology. All rights reserved. 0040- 165X/94/3504-0007$01.00 857 858 Larry Stewart of this exhibition is the extent to which the 18th century regarded science and technology to be interwoven. This was more than using mechanical apparatus to reveal basic natural laws; it was likewise a promotion of mechanical achievement and the foundation for a claim often made that natural philosophers were the best preservative against failure. Behind the early days of this collection lies the highly charged world of 18th-century politics. Creatures of the Hanoverian court like Lord Bute, tutor to the future King George III, were important in making science a fundamental part of the education of a young prince. His relationship with Lord Bute was perhaps the most significant factor in the early reign of George III. Bute’s role, first as tutor and then as principal advisor to George III in the turbulent transitions of the Seven Years’ War, was the basis of much criticism. At least Bute’s interest in natural philosophy was inherited by the new king, laying the foundation for a royal commission to George Adams for scientific instruments, among which are a number ofmagnificent pieces such as the fine Prince of Wales microscope (fig. 1), which presumably dates just before 1760. In addition (and dominating the entrance to the exhibition) is the large and dramatic, though less obviously useful, silver microscope (fig. 2) that likely was made during the reign of George III for the future George IV. Throughout the collection there are a number of pieces of mechani­ cal apparatus, such as an inclined horse-way designed to demonstrate the effects of different types of carriage wheels, as well as a compound engine and a philosophical table from the early years of the reign, all of which Adams designed to reveal basic mechanical principles. Physics at the 18th-century court is a large part of the message of this exhibition. But it is beyond this topic that the impact of the display is surely felt. One of the major developments of the 18th...