When the Sun Doesn't Shine

Leadbetter, Charles, fl. 1728. A treatise of eclipses of the sun and moon: for thirty-five years, commencing anno 1715, ending 1749...
London, John Wilcox, 1731. QB542 .L43 1731.

To add to our holdings in astronomy, the Library purchased Charles Leadbetter's A treatise of eclipses of the sun and moon, for thirty-five years, commencing anno 1715, ending 1749 (London, 1731). Leadbetter, known primarily as a mathematician and surveyor, gained fame for his accurate prediction of the 1715 total solar eclipse. Two years later he produced the first edition of this work, covering the eclipses from 1717 to 1743. The work we obtained is the second edition wherein Leadbetter extended his coverage of eclipses from 1715 (his favorite!) to 1749. It is also very interesting that at the end of the book there is additional coverage of the transits of Mercury and Venus from 1720 to 1799. As an additional bonus, the book contains a preliminary leaf with advertisements for other books by Leadbetter. This advertisement is known only in one other copy at the British Library. The work makes a fine addition to the Dibner Library's works on eclipses and our copies of two other books by him on astronomy and surveying and a third astronomical work edited by him. Copies of this book in the USA are only found at Yale, UCLA, U. Chicago, U. Michigan, and San Diego State.

My Steam Engine Is Better Than Yours

Falck, Nikolai Detlef, 1736-1783. An account and description of an improved steam engine...
London, B. Law, 1776. TJ464 .F35 1776.

Our technology collection received a boost from our purchase of a small pamphlet, An account and description of an improved steam engine… (London, 1776) by the incredibly unknown fellow, Nikolai Detlef Falck. This is a fascinating little work that is an excellent supplement to our many works on steam engines and steam technology. James Watt's great contribution to steam technology was his use of a separate condenser, patented in 1769, on the old Newcomen engine, thus preventing the large waste of steam that occurred with the old design. Watt took many years to actually produce a machine that worked according to his design, and in the interim, other alternative schemes arose. Falck's work is interesting as an example of someone who thought Watt's improvements would not work in the long run. This book details his disagreement with Watt's patent and how he feels that atmospheric pressure will provide more impetus than the pressure produced by the Watt engine. He may not have been right, but his work remains interesting nonetheless. One fascinating aspect of Falck’s engine did eventually make it into practice, however: the idea to use two cylinders to provide continuous torque to a drive shaft by means of a system of chains. OCLC, RLIN, and NUC only list copies of this work at Harvard, Princeton, and U. of Michigan.

So You Want To Be an Engineer?

Hachette, Jean Nicolas Pierre, 1769-1834. Programme du cours élémentaire des machines, pour l'an 1808.
Lanz, José María de, b.1764, and Betancourt, Augustín de, 1758-1824. Essai sur la composition des machines.
Paris, De L'Imprimerie impériale, 1808. TJ175 .L29 1808.

Another engineering purchase was of the dual texts: Jean Nicolas Pierre Hachette's Programme du cours élémentaire des machines and Philippe Louis Lanz and Augustin de Bethencourt y Molina's Essai sur la composition des machines (Paris, 1808). Hachette occupies an important role in engineering education in the nineteenth century. He taught at the Ecole Polytechnique, the first school that instilled rigorous mathematical training for engineers. The first course on basic machines was developed at the school by Hachette's teacher, Gaspard Monge. The Dibner Library has the books that came out of Monge's course, the Géométrie descriptive (1798-99) and the Traité élémentaire de statique (1794-95) as well as Hachette's revised 1811-12 edition of Monge's geometry text. Hachette's famous course on engineering mechanics was published in 1811 as Traité élémetaire des machines (also in the Dibner Library). In between those works, Hachette published a preliminary work that outlined the syllabus of his important course along with an essay by Lanz and Bethencourt that Hachette edited to form a basic text for his students, and that is the work we have just obtained. It fills a gap in our early works on engineering mechanics, and is also nicely supplemented by the Dibner Library's copies of English translations of the Lanz and Bethencourt text published in 1817 and 1820.

Carrying Coals to Manchester

Brindley, James, 1716-1772. The history of inland navigations, particularly that of the Duke of Bridgewater...
London, T. Lowndes, 1779. TC657 .B75 1779.

As a nice addition to our collection of works on canals, the Dibner Library has obtained a copy of James Brindley's The history of inland navigations: particularly that of the Duke of Bridgewater (London, 1779). This is the third edition of this landmark book in the history of canal engineering. Brindley (1716-1772), a millwright, was hired in 1759 by the Duke of Bridgewater to build a 10-mile canal to haul coal from his mines to the new industrial town of Manchester. Brindley convinced the Duke to forego using a system of locks and to go with a gravity-flow canal instead. Brindley's excellent design included both a subterranean channel and an aqueduct and the end result was that the price of coal in Manchester was reduced by one-half! The first edition of this work (1766), the first published account of canals in England, discussed the Bridgewater canal and the many others designed by Brindley, such as the Grand Trunk Canal, that were built following its success. The second edition (1769) added some material on the Trent and Mersey Canal, and this final edition was updated due to the numerous other canals that were built in the interim.

Electric Telegraphy for Dummies

Mercadier, Ernst Jules Pierre, b. 1836. Traité élémentaire de télégraphie électrique... Paris, G. Masson, 1880. TK5262 .M47 1880.

We are always on the lookout for works relating to electrical
technology for the Dibner Library as our electromagnetism holdings are the strongest part of the collection. It is hard to find things not in our library that are also affordable, but this fits the bill. It is a first edition of a handbook on electric telegraphy by Ernest Jules Pierre Mercadier, Traité élémentaire de télégraphie électrique (Paris, 1880) and it describes the latest developments in electrical storage and instruments with extensive illustrations throughout the book. Mercadier developed electric telegraphs and exhibited his multiplex telegraphic system at the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893.