Chemistry & Physics
(Brenner, Sydney) Todd, Alexander | A Time to Remember. The Autobiography of a Chemist
£450.00
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First edition, first impression. From the library of Nobel Prize-winning biologist Sydney Brenner, presentation copy inscribed from the author to Brenner on the front blank, “With respect and warmest wishes, Alexander Todd, 24th May 1984”.
The author, biochemist Alexander Todd (1907-1997), was awarded the Nobel Prize in chemistry in 1957 “for his work on the synthesis of nucleotides (the small units that make up the larger molecule of nucleic acids), the hereditary material of cells. This work led to many important advances in chemistry and biochemistry”, including the elucidation of the structure of DNA by Watson and Crick (Shampo, “Alexander Todd”, Mayo Clinic Proceedings, March 2012).
Recipient Sydney Brenner was a leader in the field of genetics almost from the moment he received his doctorate at Oxford in 1954. He joined Francis Crick’s laboratory in 1956, and they did groundbreaking research on how DNA is decoded by cells. Brenner proposed that the nucleotides which comprise DNA (adenine, guanine, thiamine and cytosine) are read by the cell in sets of three called codons, with each codon representing an amino acid (for example, three adenines in a row is the codon for the amino acid lysine). A gene is simply a string of codons that directs the production of a protein molecule from individual amino acids. He also correctly predicted the existence of messenger RNA, the molecule that carries the genetic code from the nucleus to the ribosomes, where the translation process occurs.
Following this work, it was Brenner’s efforts to establish a new laboratory organism for the study of genetics that led to his Nobel Prize. “Beginning in 1965, he began to lay the groundwork to make C. elegans, a small, transparent nematode, into a major model organism for genetics, neurobiology and developmental biology research. As a direct result of his original vision, this tiny worm became the first animal for which the complete cell lineage and entire neuronal wiring were known. Today, more than 1,000 investigators are studying C. elegans, and Brenner’s work was further honored when a closely related nematode was named Caenorhabditis brenneri” (Salk Institute biography).
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Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983.
Octavo. Original blue cloth, titles to spine in silver. With the dust jacket. Remnants of a price sticker to the front flap of the jacket. Lower corner bumped. An excellent copy in the lightly rubbed jacket that is a little faded along the spine panel.
(Brenner, Sydney) Wollman, E. L. & F. Jacob | La Sexualité des Bactéries
£4,750.00
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First edition, first impression of this uncommon and important monograph on bacterial genetics. An exceptional presentation copy signed by author François Jacob, with whom Brenner would partner only a year later to perform one of the most elegant experiments in the history of biochemistry, proving the role of messenger RNA and elucidating a key mechanism in the cell’s process for decoding DNA. Cheekily inscribed by Jacob’s co-author, Elie Wollman (1917-2008), “To Sydney Brenner, to disgust him / a good of bacterial sex” (possibly missing the word “dose” or similar before “bacterial sex”). And with Brenner’s ownership signature in pencil on the upper cover.
Wollman and Jacob were bacteriologists at the Pasteur Institute who, by investigating bacterial reproduction, made groundbreaking discoveries in genetics. They published one of the first examples of a gene regulatory mechanism; discovered plasmids (portions of genetic material independent of the chromosomal DNA); and created the first model of gene mapping in a living organism” (Dantzer, “Elie Wollman 1917-2008: A Biographical Memoir, National Academy of Science, 2008). The present volume covers the breadth of contemporary knowledge of bacterial reproduction, including conjugation and the resulting genetic recombination. Jacob was later awarded the Nobel Prize for work on the regulation of enzyme levels in cells, and Wollman received several awards, including the French Legion of Honour.
Recipient Sydney Brenner (1927-2019) was a leader in the field of genetics almost from the moment he received his doctorate at Oxford in 1954. He joined Francis Crick’s Cambridge laboratory in 1956, and they performed innovative research on how DNA is decoded by cells. Brenner proposed that the nucleotides which comprise DNA (adenine, guanine, thiamine and cytosine) are read by the cell in groups of three called codons, with each codon representing an amino acid (for example, three adenines in a row is the codon for the amino acid lysine). A gene is therefore a string of codons that directs the production of a specific protein molecule from individual amino acids. He would later win the Nobel Prize for his work establishing the nematode c. elegans as a key model organism for genetics, neurobiology and developmental biology research.
Brenner met Jacob and Wollman at a symposium on microbial genetics in Copenhagen in 1959 (it was almost certainly on this occasion, or shortly afterwards, that this copy was presented), where Jacob hoped to discuss new evidence for the existence of an intermediary molecule responsible for transporting information from DNA in the nucleus to the site of protein production in cellular structures called ribosomes, located outside the nucleus. It was known that ribosomes contained an analogue to DNA, ribosomal nucleic acid (RNA), but it was not clear whether there were intermediaries between DNA and RNA. Though nothing concrete came of the Copenhagen symposium, the following spring Jacob again brought up the subject during a meeting with Brenner, Crick, and other biochemists at Cambridge. As Jacob later recalled, when he pointed out recent experimental results suggesting that, unlike normal RNA, the messenger molecule was unstable, “Francis and Sydney leaped to their feet. Began to gesticulate. To argue at top speed in great agitation. A red-faced Francis. A Sydney with bristling eyebrows. The two talked at once, all but shouting. Each trying to anticipate the other. To explain to the other what had suddenly come to mind” (Jacob, The Statue Within, p. 312). What Brenner and Crick had suddenly remembered was another experiment showing that when a certain virus attacked bacterial cells it blocked the creation of new ribosomes, and the only RNA then manufactured by the cell was both unstable and had the same base composition as DNA, strongly suggesting that it was the messenger molecule.
That afternoon Brenner and Jacob also learned that they had both been invited to spend the month of June as visiting scholars at Caltech, the perfect opportunity to collaborate and prove that there was an intermediary in the DNA decoding process and that it was the previously discovered unstable RNA. Most importantly, the colleague who had invited Jacob, Mat Meselson, had just developed a new method for marking bacterial macromolecules with heavy isotopes. Brenner and Jacob developed a plan “to distinguish whether, after phage (virus) infection, new RNA went to new ribosomes, or whether there were no new ribosomes, just the preexisting ones ‘for hire’ – Brenner’s phrase at the time – to the new message when it came along. So that old ribosomes could be labelled, the bacteria would be grown with heavy carbon and nitrogen, the bacteria switched to a broth containing normal, lighter isotopes and simultaneously infected with phage, and new RNA labelled with radiophosphorous. Then ribosomes would be separated from bacteria, put into a cesium-chloride solution, and spun at thirty-seven thousand revolutions per minute for thirty-six hours... in this enormous centrifugal force... the cesium chloride in the solution became distributed in a gradient that was denser towards the bottom of the tube; anything of like density in the tube would sink or float to the level that exactly corresponded with it. Thus, ribosomal particles grown heavy before infection would form a band farther down the centrifuge tube than any made after infection when the isotopic labels were light. Radioactivity could then be checked in each band of ribosomes” (Judson, The Eighth Day of Creation, p. 423).
With only four weeks to complete the experiment, Brenner and Jacob worked at speed and had to overcome numerous setbacks, from the difficulty of acquiring radioactive phosphorus to problems caused by a lack of magnesium in their culture medium. But the final result was “spectacular. Eyes glued to the Geiger counter, our throats tight, we tracked each successive figure as it came to take its place in exactly the order we had been expecting. And as the last sample was counted, a double shout of joy shook the basement at Caltech. Followed immediately by a wild double jig. This was merely one experiment, performed in extremis… But we now knew that we had won. That our conception explained the transfers of information in the synthesis of proteins… Scarcely was the experiment over than we gave a seminar at Caltech to demonstrate the existence of X and its role as magnetic tape. No one believed us. The next day we left, each to his own home. The bet had paid off. In the nick of time” (Jacob, p. 317).
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Paris: Masson et Cie, Libraires de l’Académie de Médecine, 1959.
Octavo. Original grey wrappers printed in black. 3 double-sided plates from photographs. Wrappers rubbed, a little creased, and partially tanned with a few small spots and marks. Slight crease affecting the margins of the first half of the contents. A very good copy.
(Landsberg, Peter) Hawking, Stephen W. | A Brief History of Time
£350.00
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First edition, the corrected second printing of this landmark popular work on the quest for the Grand Unified Theory. From the library of physicist Peter Landsberg, with his ownership signature, notes and highlighting, and letter to him loosely inserted.
Peter Landsberg (1922-2010), was a German Jewish refugee to Britain who earned his PhD in quantum mechanics at Imperial College London in 1949 and joined the faculties of the Universities of Cardiff and Southampton. “Landsberg was not solely interested in one branch of physics, he was interested in physics in general and this boyish enthusiasm took his research to all areas of theoretical work”, among them the quantum phenomenon known as bose condensation, the relationship between quantum mechanics and living things, thermodynamics, cosmology, and applications of solar energy. He is best known for his explication of “Landsberg efficiency”, the theoretical limits on how much solar power can be converted to electricity in a given situation (obituary in The Scotsman, May 23, 2010).
Landsberg has made numerous short notes — often page number references — and underlined a number of passages, primarily in chapters 8: The Origin and Fate of the Universe and 9: The Arrow of Time, that deal with thermodynamics and the inflationary model of the universe. Loosely inserted is a typed letter signed to Landsberg from Canon Robert Winnett (1910-1989), to whom the book had been loaned, and who writes that it conveyed to him “a sense of the infinite mystery of the universe, and of unplumbed depths still to be explored, an attitude which is surely akin to the religious”. He goes on the discuss how scientific ideas about the origin of the universe might align with Christianity and other religions, ending with the thought that “we are dealing with probabilities rather than certainties... The origins of religion lie in dimensions of human experience other than the scientific, and any cosmological theory can be interpreted theistically, or if we will, atheistically”.
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...From the Big Bang to Black Holes. Introduction by Carl Sagan. Illustrations by Ron Miller. New York: Bantam Books, 1988.
Octavo. Original black quarter cloth, dark grey boards, title to spine in silver, Hawking’s monogram to upper board in blind. With the dust jacket. Illustrations throughout the text. Binding a little rubbed and bumped. A very good copy in the rubbed and creased jacket with some bubbling of the plastic coating, especially along folds.
(Maxwell, James Clerk) Goldman, Martin | The Demon in the Aether
Sold Out
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First edition, first impression of this biography of physicist James Clerk Maxwell (1831-1879).
Maxwell was the first scientist to describe electricity, light, and magnetism as different manifestations of the same phenomenon, and to demonstrate that light and magnetic fields travel through space as waves. His equations for electromagnetism are considered the second great unification of physics, Newton’s laws having been the first, and they laid the groundwork for special relativity and quantum mechanics.
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...The Story of James Clerk Maxwell. Edinburgh: Paul Harris Publishing in association with Adam Hilger Ltd, 1983.
Octavo. Original black boards, titles to spine gilt. With the dust jacket. 6 double-sided plates. Very slightly rubbed at the extremities. An excellent copy in the price-clipped and lightly rubbed jacket with some fading of the spine panel and adjacent portions of the other panels.
Clow, Archibald & Nan L. | The Chemical Revolution
£30.00
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First edition, first impression of this comprehensive history of chemistry’s role in the Industrial Revolution by a professor of chemistry at the University of Aberdeen. A very nice copy.
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...A Contribution to Social Technology. London: The Batchworth Press, 1952.
Large octavo. Original blue cloth, title to spine gilt. Colour frontispiece and 52 black and white plates. A couple of tiny pencil notes in the margins, leaf of manuscript notes loosely inserted. Spine rolled, cloth lightly rubbed at the extremities. An excellent copy, the contents clean.
Feynman, Richard & Steven Weinberg | Elementary Particles and the Laws of Physics
£100.00
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First edition, first impression. An attractive copy of this uncommon book on the quest to reconcile relativity and quantum mechanics.
These two lectures were presented at Cambridge in 1986 in honour of Paul Dirac (1902-1984), one of the primary architects of quantum mechanics, who died in 1984. Authors Richard Feynman and Steven Weinberg were two of the heavyweights of modern physics and were both strongly influenced by Dirac. Feynman (1918-1988) worked on the Manhattan project before winning the Nobel Prize for his theory of quantum electrodynamics, and became a pop culture figure after publishing his best-selling memoir, Surely You're Joking Mr. Feynman. Weinberg (1933-2021), who was widely considered the most important physicist of the late 20th century, received the Nobel for uniting the weak nuclear force with electromagnetism.
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...The 1986 Dirac Memorial Lectures. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987.
Octavo. Original red cloth, titles to spine gilt. With the dust jacket. Portrait frontispiece of Paul Dirac by Richard Feynman. Cloth very lightly rubbed at the tips, two tiny areas with loss of size from the head of the spine, small production flaw in the gutter of the rear endpapers. An excellent, fresh copy in the jacket that is very lightly rubbed at the extremities with a few short closed tears and nicks and a Kroch’s & Brentano’s price ticket to the lower panel of the jacket.
Freundlich, Erwin | Die Grundlagen der Einsteinschen Gravitationstheorie
£125.00
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Second impression (originally published the previous year) of this proposal for testing Einstein’s theory of relativity by the astronomer Erwin Finlay-Freundlich (1885-1964).
Freundlich knew Einstein well during the period when they both lived in Berlin, and astronomical proofs of Einstein’s theories were among his major research interests. “The quest for high accuracy in the measurement of the redshift in the solar spectrum led him to plan the building of the famous Einstein tower in Potsdam. he was also involved in some of the earliest attempts to measure the deflection of starlight during eclipses. In the summer of 1914 he led an expedition to the Crimea to observe a total solar eclipse. Caught by the outbreak of the First World War, he and some of his party were interned by the Russians as enemy aliens. Fortunately, the group was soon exchanged for some Russian officers who had been early taken as prisoners of war” (Batten “Obituary: Erwin Finlay-Freundlich”, Journal of the British Astronomical Association, issue 1, vol. 96, p. 33, 1985).
It is possible that this failure led to the rapid acceptance of general relativity several years later. “Einstein had not completed his work on that theory in 1914, and was predicting a deflection of starlight... only half the value that he gave in the definitive paper of 1915. Had Freundlich been successful in 1914, he would thus have found twice the expected value, and Einstein’s later paper, instead of appearing as a brilliant predication, might have seemed an ad hoc adjustment of the theory to fit the observations” (Batten, p. 33). -
...Mit einem Vorwort von Albert Einstein. Berlin: Julius Springer, 1917.
Duodecimo. Original cream wrappers printed in black. 1 leaf of publisher’s ads at rear. Short pencil note to upper wrapper. Wrappers toned and rubbed with a few small marks, creases and nicks. Contents fresh. A very good copy.
G. Nicolis & I. Prigogine | Self-Organization in Nonequilibrium Systems
£500.00
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First edition first printing. Presentation copy inscribed by Nobel Prize winner Ilya Prigogine, and also signed by co-author Grégoire Nicolis, for fellow physicist Peter Landsberg. Books signed by either Prigogine and Nicolis are uncommon. With a small pencilled notation of Landsberg’s on page 34 also repeated with a question mark on the front free endpaper.
Ilya Prigogine (1917-2003) is today one of the most well-known figures in the field of chaos theory. Though others before him, primarily Lars Onsager, had investigated the thermodynamics of irreversible processes (such as metabolic reactions in living things, or the boiling of an egg), it was Priogione who extended our understanding of them to systems that were far from equilibrium. His most important contribution was the discovery that in these systems chaos can lead to the development of ordered structures that only exist in conjunction with their environment. These he called “dissipative structures” to differentiate them from equilibrium structures (such as crystals) that can exist as isolated systems. “The most well-known dissipative structure is perhaps the so-called Benárd instability. This is formed when a layer of liquid is heated from below. At a given temperature heat conduction starts to occur predominantly through convection, and it can be observed that regularly spaced, hexagonal convection cells are formed in the layer of liquid. This structure is wholly dependent on the supply of heat and disappears when this ceases” (Noble Prize biography). The present volume covers all aspects of this new field, from the mathematical models underpinning it, to its application in chemistry, cell biology, and even the flows of energy across whole ecosystems.
Co-author Grégoire Nicolis (1939-2018) was also a leader in this new field of complex systems in statistical mechanics. His work — frequently in collaboration with Prigione — produced important “early discoveries in chaos theory” that “constitute part of its foundations as they brought forth deep connections on nonlinear dynamics and out-of-equilibrium processes in physics and chemistry at large” (Basios, “Grégoire Nicolis of the Founders of Complexity Science, a Recollection”, Nonlinear Phenomena in Complex Systems, vol. 23, no. 2, 2020, p. 102).
The recipient of this volume, Peter Landsberg (1922-2010), was a German Jewish refugee to Britain who earned his PhD in quantum mechanics at Imperial College London in 1949 and joined the faculties of the Universities of Cardiff and Southampton. “Landsberg was not solely interested in one branch of physics, he was interested in physics in general and this boyish enthusiasm took his research to all areas of theoretical work”, which included the quantum phenomenon known as bose condensation, the relationship between quantum mechanics and living things, thermodynamics, cosmology, and applications of solar energy. He is best known for his explication of “Landsberg efficiency”, the theoretical limits on how much solar power can be converted to electricity in a given situation (obituary in The Scotsman, May 23, 2010).
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...From Dissipative Structures to Order through Fluctuations. New York: a Wiley-Interscience Publication, John Wiley & Sons, 1977.
Octavo. Original blue-grey cloth, titles to spine and ISBN on lower board in metallic blue, publisher’s device to upper board in blind. With the dust jacket. Diagrams and illustrations throughout the text. Cloth slightly rubbed at the tips, two small worn spots on the edge of the upper board. A very good copy in the jacket that is creased and worn with some closed tears and small chips.
Gowing, Margaret | Britain and Atomic Energy
£650.00
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RESERVED First editions, first impressions. The complete set of this important work by the foremost historian of Britain’s nuclear policy, together with the uncommon guide to the unpublished government papers cited in the first book, Britain and Atomic Energy 1939-1945. Rare in such nice condition.
Margaret Gowing (1921-1998) “was at once a distinguished historian and a redoubtable champion of a variety of causes that reflected her keen perception of what constituted the public interest. Her scholarly reputation rested primarily on her magisterial studies of atomic energy in Britain during and after the Second World War” (obituary in the Independent, November 20, 1998).
Gowing took a First in economic history at the London School of Economics in 1941, then held posts at the Ministry of Supply and Board of Trade, followed by the Cabinet Office, where she spent fourteen years as part of the team producing civil histories of the Second World War. In 1959 she joined the Atomic Energy Authority as historian and archivist.
“In Britain and Atomic Energy 1939-1945 (1964) and its two-volume sequel, Independence and Deterrence (1974, written with the assistance of her friend and collaborator Lorna Arnold), she offered a characteristically clear-eyed account of the fashioning and implementation of British policy with regard to atomic energy from the outbreak of the war until October 1952, when "Hurricane" - the test of a rather primitive bomb at Monte Bello, a group of islands off the north-west coast of Australia - propelled Britain to the status of the world's third nuclear power.
These books, along with her many articles, major public lectures, and penetrating reviews, established her not merely as a peerless chronicler and analyst of a crucial facet of the war effort and of Britain's subsequent struggles to maintain great power status, but also as a leading commentator on the relations between science and government. Her election first to the British Academy in 1975 and 13 years later to the Royal Society recognised equally the quality and the breadth of her work and placed her, with Sir Karl Popper and Joseph Needham, among the tiny handful of those who have been Fellows of both bodies” (the Independent).
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Britain and Atomic Energy 1939-1945 [together with] Britain and Atomic Energy: Independence and Deterrence 1945-1952, volume I Policy Making, and volume II Policy Execution [and] References to Official Papers, July 1980. London: Macmillan & Co. Ltd. & the Authority Historian’s Office, 1964, 1974 & 1980.
Britain and Atomic Energy 1939-1945: Octavo. Original red cloth, titles to spine in copper on black ground and in gilt. With the dust jacket that is price-clipped and has contemporary Macmillan price tickets to the front flap. Cloth only very lightly rubbed at the extremities, a little spotting to the top edge of the text block, minor creasing to the lower corner of the prefatory leaves. An excellent, fresh copy in the price-clipped jacket that is a little rubbed, toned, and creased along the edges.
Britain and Atomic Energy 1939-1945: References to Official Papers: 32-page photocopied pamphlet, wire-stitched, in green wrappers printed in black. Fine condition.
Britain and Atomic Energy 1945-1952: Independence and Deterrence, volume I: Original dark blue cloth, titles to spine gilt, blue endpapers and top edge. Corners bumped, spine slightly rolled, short closed tears affecting the margin of pages 97-100. An excellent copy in the jacket that is lightly rubbed along the edges.
Britain and Atomic Energy 1945-1952: Independence and Deterrence, volume 2: Original dark blue cloth, titles to spine gilt, blue endpapers and top edge. Corners bumped, spine slightly rolled. An excellent copy in the jacket that is lightly rubbed along the edges. 4 double-sided plates from photographs in each of the three primary volumes.
Hahn, Otto & Fritz Strassman | Die Chemische Abscheidung der bei Spaltung des Urans entstehenden Elemente und Atomarten
£750.00
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The true offprint, in the orange wrappers, of the third of Hahn and Strassman’s “three fundamental papers on nuclear fission, containing the first comprehensive account of the phenomenon” (Hook & Norman, Norman Library of Science and Medicine 963). Offprints in the orange wrappers labelled “Einzelausgabe” are the true offprints, because these only ever contained a single paper. The “Abhandlungen” issues in the green wrappers are not true offprints because they could contain multiple papers, though in the case of the Hahn & Strassman fission papers each contains only the one paper.
“In 1938 Hahn and Strassman had demonstrated the presence of radioactive barium, lanthanum and cerium among the products of neutron bombardment of uranium, an observation that seemed to contradict all previous experiences of nuclear physics” (Hook & Norman, Norman Library of Science and Medicine 963). They announced these unexplained findings in an earlier paper published in Naturwissenschaften on January 6th, 1939, but before that wrote to Lise Meitner, then in exile in Copenhagen, “telling her of their baffling discovery and asking for advice. It was this letter that inspired Meitner and her nephew Otto Frisch to create their hypothesis of a fission process, which they published on 11 February 1939” (Hook & Norman). The first paper in the series was published on September 18th, 1939, with the second appearing in 1942.
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...(Allgemeiner Teil). Aus den Abhandlungen der Preußischen Akademie der Wisenschaften Jahrgang 1944. Math.-naturw. Klasse. Nr. 12. Einzelausgabe. Berlin: Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1944.
Quarto. 14-page offprint. Original orange wrappers printed in black. Just a little rubbed and toned along the edges, contents very light toned in the margins. An excellent copy.
Hahn, Otto & Fritz Strassman | Über das Zerplatzen des Urankernes durch langsame Neutronen
£1,250.00
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The Abhandlungen offprint of the first of Hahn and Strassman’s “three fundamental papers on nuclear fission, containing the first comprehensive account of the phenomenon” (Hook & Norman, Norman Library of Science and Medicine 963). Abhandlungen issues in the green wrappers are not true offprints because they could contain multiple papers, though in the case of the Hahn & Strassman fission papers each contains only the one paper. Offprints in the orange wrappers labelled “Einzelausgabe” are the true offprints, as these only ever contained a single paper.
"In 1938 Hahn and Strassman had demonstrated the presence of radioactive barium, lanthanum and cerium among the products of neutron bombardment of uranium, an observation that seemed to contradict all previous experiences of nuclear physics” (Norman 963). They announced these unexplained findings in an earlier paper published in Naturwissenschaften on January 6th, 1939, but before that wrote to Lise Meitner, then in exile in Copenhagen, “telling her of their baffling discovery and asking for advice. It was this letter that inspired Meitner and her nephew Otto Frisch to create their hypothesis of a fission process, which they published on 11 February 1939” (Norman). The present paper was presented at the May 25th, 1939 meeting of the Akademie and published on September 18th of that year. The following two papers in this series would not appear until 1942 and 1944. -
...Abhandlungen der Preußischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. Jahrgang 1939. Mathematisch-naturwissenschaftliche Klasse. Berlin: Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1939. Quarto. 20-page offprint, original green wrappers printed in black. A little fading along the spine and edges, lightly rubbed at the extremities. An excellent copy.
Hammond, P. W. & Harold Egan | Weighed in the Balance. A History of the Laboratory of the Government Chemist
£15.00
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First edition, first impression of this comprehensive account of the history of government chemical and measurement standards laboratories in the United Kingdom. A very nice copy.
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London: Her Majesty’s Stationery Office for the Laboratory of the Government Chemist, 1992.
Quarto. Original green boards, titles to spine and crest with balance and crown to the upper board gilt. With the dust jacket. Illustrations from photographs throughout the text. Corners bumped, also slightly affecting the corners of the dust jacket, but otherwise fresh. An excellent copy.
Harrison, Stephen | Emanational Physics. A New Theoretical Prolegomenon
£650.00
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The “second edition” of this rare and unusual self-published text proposing to correct the entire field of modern physics by reframing it metaphysically. Described as a “not-for-sale” edition “limited to 100 copies”, this copy was sent to Allan R. Sandage, the astronomer who determined the first reasonably accurate values for the Hubble Constant and the age of the universe and was considered “the greatest and most influential observational astronomer of the last half-century” (NY Times obituary, November 17, 2010). Sandage’s name appears twice on the recipients list in the front matter (once as no. 2 on the list, and then misspelled on a taped and glued-on addition) and an introductory letter from the author to Sandage, dated 1993, is loosely inserted.
We have been unable to locate much information on the author, Stephen Harrison. The biography on the verso of the dedication leaf describes him as “a science graduate of London University” and “now an American citizen” who is “currently an independent consultant in the ‘High Technology’ field in the Washington D. C. area”. His business card describes him as the “principal scientist” for Directed Technologies, Inc. of Bethesda Maryland, of which we can find no record. The printed address on the card is for a suburban house, and it has been crossed out and corrected with another address for an apartment complex about a mile away. Surprisingly, Harrison has a Linkedin profile, though it is empty except for his title, “independent computer software professional, Bethesda Maryland” and his education history: “London University 1938-1948”. There is no “London University” (at least not since 1836), and it is unclear whether this is entirely fictitious, or if he meant one of the real institutions with a similar name. And while the dates seem questionable, as they put him in his late 80s when Linkedin was founded, an obituary confirming his age appeared in the Washington Post on March 16th, 2016: “Stephen Harrison, philosopher, author of The New Monadology, died peacefully March 12, 2016 at age 96 with his daughters Barbara Harrison and Frances Stroscio by his side”.
In the prefatory matter Harrison also lists three other books he has written: “The Mind/Brain Problem, copyright 1981/1982/1984/1986”, “Artificial Intelligence: A House Built Upon the Sand, 1984”, and “The New Monadology (forthcoming)”. We can locate no institutional copies of Emanational Physics, and only one institutional copy of any of the other books: The New Monadology, at Perdue University, though the copyright date provided in WorldCat is 1981, which would be significantly earlier than indicated by the information here.
This copy seems have been mailed to Sandage a few years after “publication”, as the enclosed letter is dated May 29th, 1993 (as Sandage’s name appears twice in the recipients list, it may have been sent twice). Harrison writes, “I believe you will enjoy some of the chapters of the enclosed, though I fear you must end up dismissing me as a good man gone wrong. One of my complaints with modern cosmology is the way in which they proceed sui generis in the absence of the broader considerations of Mind and Spirituality — which are, so to speak, brought in as afterthoughts, rather than being given equal weight at the outset. Also, the failure to distinguish between Eternity and Endless Time; and between the Potential and the Completed Infinity. Finitude and Temporality, surely, belong in the realm of physical existence, with Infinity and Eternity providing the necessary context beyond.”
The contents of this volume are difficult to describe, but comprise an elaborate, conservative-leaning pseudo-scientific/philosophical critique of modern physics and cosmology, primarily relativity, quantum mechanics, positivism, and materialist understandings of human consciousness. As Harrison writes in the preface, “It is no secret that the state of theoretical physics & cosmology is replete with contradictions and paradoxes. It’s a mess — and, according to such Establishment spokesmen as Richard Feynman, there’s not much we can do about it. Nature is ‘absurd’ and we have no choice but to accept the fact with as good a grace as we are able to muster. I don’t believe it... What’s wrong with physics takes origin, in my view, from what’s wrong with physicists. What is chiefly wrong with physicists is that they are metaphysically light-weight... this handicap of philosophical myopia is canonised into the virtue of emancipation; they believe that the findings and discoveries of physics have somehow pre-empted metaphysics — which may now be discarded as so much useless baggage — and that empiricism has somehow proved itself to be completely self-contained and self-sufficient.”
Not surprisingly, he goes on to explain that, “undaunted by my limited grasp of modern physics, I decided to blunder in, and try my hand at clearing up the mess. What are my credentials? First, I am familiar with the basics and have enough understanding of mathematics to be able to protect myself from the occasional abuses of mathematicians. I have spent much of my life as a consultant in various areas of ‘hard’ science and engineering, and my experience in this occupation has caused me to become monumentally unimpressed by and suspicious of ‘experts’; one thing in which many of them are truly expert in is seeing the trees and missing the woods”.
The text itself is dense and complex, with numerous citations and illustrations, a few of which are coloured in by hand. It begins with an introduction to some of the mysteries and paradoxes of modern physics and a historical outline of “how we got into the present mess”, as well as chapters titled “Ad Hominem: The Intellectual Scrutinized” and “The Decay of Common Sense”. Harrison’s solution to these problems, a system he terms “emanational physics” involves building blocks called “corpuscles” and “reintroducing the Aether” to theory, and it covers the mind, the fabric of the universe, and his conceptualisation of the origin and end of the universe — what he calls the Alpha and Omega.
In the preface, Harrison explains that this second edition has appeared only six months after the first, “chiefly as a result of my very recent discovery of literature sources critical of relativity. At the same time I learned why I had to dig so deep to find this material; it seems it is not easy to publish material contrary to the Establishment Doctrine... In reviewing this material I cannot help but conclude that the case against special relativity is about as solid as can be... I am even tempted to say that it is the most disconfirmed hypothesis since the Phlogiston Theory. Yet it retains its firm occupancy of Stage Center”.
Among the 90 recipients of this text (who must have been thrilled) are mathematician Roger Penrose, AI and information theorist Kenneth M. Sayre, and physicists Murray Gell-Mann, Steven Weinberg, Stephen Hawking, Freeman Dyson, John Archibald Wheeler, James Hartle, and Sheldon Glashow (among many others). A number of non-scientists are also included, such as the conservative political philosopher Paul Gottfried, Scottish Protestant theologian Thomas F. Torrance, Benedictine historian of science Stanley Jaki, and religious philosopher Richard Swinbourne.
Most remarkably, at least a few of them engaged somewhat seriously with Harrison’s text. In the preface he thanks “a number of readers who sent in their comments in response to the original edition — spanning various degrees of agreement and disagreement; several of them brought an important error to my attention (concerning the astronaut round-trip paradox)”. Mathematician Joseph Gerver is specially praised for “his very detailed commentary on a number of points”. And not only did neuroscientist and philosopher Raymond Tallis read Emanational Physics, he cited it in his 1991 book on consciousness, The Explicit Animal. Harrison had used a quotation he attributed to physicist David Bohm, and Tallis includes it in The Explicit Animal, with a footnote reading, “I do not know the original provenance of this passage. It is cited by Stephen Harrison in his remarkable unpublished manuscript Emanational Physics”. The same passage is then used by philosopher Mary Midgley in her book The Ethical Primate, with a footnote referring to Tallis and Harrison: “Tallis says no further details are given. The passage seems, however, to express Bohm’s habitual views and does not in any way appear suspect”.
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...Second Edition. Bethesda, Maryland: privately published, 1988.
Comb-bound photocopy, text on both the rectos and versos. Title on yellow paper. Original brown paper covers, the upper cover with a plastic window for the title and “BK Dynamics” embossed in gold. The author’s Directed Technologies business card, with the address corrected by hand, is stapled to the upper cover. Illustrations, charts and graphs throughout, one coloured by hand. The author’s name and address in pencil partially erased from the title. Occasional additions and corrections made by taping or pasting in new slips of paper.
Johnston, James F. W. | The Chemistry of Common Life
£250.00
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First complete edition of this popular Victorian work on the chemistry of the everyday, published in two volumes the year after the first volume appeared.
Author James F. W. Johnston (1796-1855) was a chemist and lecturer, and together with David Brewster one of the founders of the British Association for the Advancement of Science. His association with J. J. Berzelius “brought him prestige and fuelled his interest in the way atoms might be arranged in compounds; though chemical atomic theory was still very hypothetical in the 1830s, some inferences could be made. In 1837 he wrote an important report for the British Association meeting at Newcastle upon Tyne, on the relationship between chemical constitution and properties. In 1833 Johnston was appointed reader in chemistry at the newly founded and staunchly Anglican University of Durham, despite belonging to the Church of Scotland. At Durham he strenuously promoted a course in engineering, which involved highly practical work and some advanced chemistry and mathematics... Johnston became a successful popular lecturer and writer at a time when such activity did not diminish a professional reputation. In 1851 he published Notes on North America, following a visit there in 1849–50. This was concerned particularly with agriculture, on which he had become an expert—a good move in the ‘hungry Forties’. His brief Catechism of Agricultural Chemistry and Geology (1844) went through more than thirty editions in his lifetime, was widely translated, and was recommended by Tolstoy among others, and his more formal Elements of Agricultural Chemistry and Geology (1842) was also a great success, with a nineteenth edition in 1895. He provided introduction and notes for the Dutch professor G. T. Mulder's Chemistry of Vegetable and Animal Physiology (1845) and for Mulder's controversial claims against Liebig published in the following year. His Chemistry of Common Life, which was completed in 1855 just before his death, was a classic popularization of up-to-date science” (ODNB).
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Edinburgh & London: William Blackwood and Sons, 1855.
2 volumes, octavo (178 x 113 mm). Contemporary brown half calf, spines gilt in compartments, red morocco labels, marbled sides, endpapers, and edges. Steel engravings throughout the text. H7 and 8 unopened. Lacking the ads normally present. Bindings rubbed, occasional light spotting to contents. A very good set.
Lorentz, Hendrik A. & G. L. de Haas-Lorentz (ed.) | Impressions of His Life and Work
£150.00
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First edition, first printing. A very attractive copy in the uncommon glassine jacket.
Hendrik Lorentz (1853-1928) was a theoretical physicist at the University of Leiden who made important contributions to our understanding electromagnetism and relativity, and was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1902 for his explanation of the Zeeman effect. Lorentz laid much of the groundwork for Einstein’s theory of special relativity, and he was supportive of the younger scientist’s discovery, discussing it in a series of important papers and lectures. He was also one of the few physicists to support Einstein’s search for a theory of general relativity. This volume, published posthumously, contains contains eleven reminiscences of Lorentz by colleagues and family, including one by Einstein.
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Amsterdam: North-Holland Publishing Company, 1957.
Octavo. Original red cloth, titles to spine gilt, facsimile signature to upper board gilt, top edge dyed yellow. With the original glassine jacket. Portrait frontispiece, five plates and an illustration within the text. Ownership ink stamp of Rudolph W. Preisendorfer with manuscript phone number on the front free endpaper. Minor bumps to corners, free endpapers partially toned. An excellent, fresh copy in the jacket that is a little rubbed and yellowed with a white spot on the lower panel.
Metzger, Hélène | Newton, Stahl, Boerhaave et la Doctrine Chimique
£50.00
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Second edition, facsimile reissue of this influential work in the history of science, originally published in 1930.
Hélène Metzger (1889-1944) studied science against the wishes of her father, specialising in crystallography at the Sorbonne. Her first degree was awarded based on her study of lithium chlorate, and her doctoral thesis, submitted in 1918, was on the historical origins of crystallography. “From this beginning, Metzger began her focus on the history of chemistry, particularly French history in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. She moved away from the ‘great man’ idea of science and focused instead on the importance of lesser-known figures who often held ‘false’ theories... She continued to write the history of ideas as they existed within their particular timeframe” and “was active in history of science organizatios” (Ogilvie, Biographical Dictionary of Women in Science, p. 889).
Metzger was an outsider for most of her life. “This status, doubtless related to her being a woman, especially one with a fairly low self-image, was made possible by Metzger’s economic independence. However, she found recognition and much comfort from a number of great scholars, notably André Lalande in Paris (who arranged a literary prize for her in 1924), and George Sarton at Harvard, the founder and editor of Isis, the major journal in the history of science, with whom she regularly exchanged letters... It is owing to her anti-positivistic historical method, which today is shared by most historians of science, that Metzger’s work is still appreciated and used today. (The late Thomas S. Kuhn’s favorable mention of Metzger in his celebrated The Structure of Scientific Revolutions [1962] played a determining role in this respect.)” (Freudenthal, Metzger’s entry in the Shalvi/Hyman Encyclopedia of Jewish Women).
During the Nazi occupation of France Metzger openly embraced her Jewish identity. “She remained in Paris until late 1941 and then moved to Lyon, where, again, she did not hesitate to register as a Jew. During the more than two years she remained there, she took part in an extraordinary enterprise: the “Bureau d'études juives” (Office for Jewish Studies), an informal group of persons—professors, teachers, lawyers, high state officials, publishers, etc.—who had been dismissed from their positions and who met weekly in order to study Judaism. Most of these people had had a very feeble relation to and knowledge of their Jewish roots, and they now gathered in order to learn something about the history of the tradition which was the cause of their misfortune. This was a heroic act of spiritual resistance: ‘in the troubled, dramatic and tragic period through which we live,’Metzger wrote to George Sarton in 1942, ‘[intellectual] effort is the only thing which can maintain us in a physical and moral stability’” (Freudenthal). Metzger was deported to Auschwitz and murdered in March, 1944.
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...Nouveau Tirage. Paris: Librairie Scientifique et Technique Albert Blanchard, 1974.
Octavo. Original grey wrappers printed in black. Contents unopened. Slight creasing of the spine, a few small dark spots to the lower wrapper and a faint spot to the upper wrapper. An excellent copy.
Neurath, Marie | Inside the Atom
Sold Out
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RESERVED First edition, first impression of this important work of science illustration by data-visualisation pioneer Marie Neurath (1898-1986).
Neurath, together with her husband Otto and their colleague Gerd Arntz, was one of the founders of Isotype, a simplified visual method of displaying complex information to the public. First developed in the 1920s, and originally known as the Vienna Method of Pictorial Statistics, the goal of Isotype was ”to cross national and social divides in a time before widespread global communication. To do that, Isotype went back to basics and stripped away all things unnecessary, illogical, or alienating—and in doing so, helped to establish some of the core principles of graphic design. Today, Isotype’s legacy can be seen everywhere from newspapers and textbooks to signage, transit maps, interfaces, and emojis” (Inglis, “Meet Marie Neurath,” AIGA Eye on Design, September 17, 2019).
Marie Neurath “was a remarkable practitioner” who “researched, calculated, and co-designed nearly every Isotype ever created, from the early days in Vienna in 1925 all the way to when she retired in 1971” (Forrest, “The Missing Legacy of Marie Neurath,” Medium, January 20, 2020). She described her role as that of the “Transformer” of data, writing that “From the data given in words and figures, a way has to be found to extract the essential facts and put them into picture form. It is the responsibility of the transformer to understand the data, to get all necessary information from the expert, to decide what is worth transmitting to the public, how to make it understandable, how to link it with general knowledge or with information already given in other charts. In this sense, the transformer is the trustee of the public” (Neurath, The Transformer, 2009).
Marie continued the work after Otto’s death in 1945, becoming best known for the series of children’s books she published over the next twenty years. “In children’s educational books Marie found an ideal place to put Isotype’s methods into practice. Young readers were more engaged by pictures than words, and this focus on the visual meant these books were easily translated and published abroad, fulfilling Isotype’s original aims of being truly international” (Inglis).
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London: Max Parrish, Isotype. Printed by Graphic Reproductions Ltd., 1956.
Quarto. Original red cloth-patterned boards, titles to spine and upper board, and crystal design to upper board gilt. 3-colour offset lithography. Corners bumped, spine rolled, boards darkened corresponding to jacket chips, contents toned with occasional small spots, spotting to edges of text block. A good copy in the dulled and marked jacket with chips from the corners and ends of the spine, and a closed tear running halfway up the spine panel.
Perry, John | The Romance of Science. Spinning Tops.
£75.00
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Second edition, first published in 1890. A nice copy of this book which is scarce in all early editions. Copiously illustrated and in the attractive publisher’s cloth. Unusually, there is a contemporary pencilled note on the dedication leaf stating “no! no!!” in reference to the printed acknowledgement of Sir William Thomson as “the real author of whatever is worth publication in the following pages”.
Electrical engineer and mathematician John Perry (1850-1920) lectured at the Royal College of Science and the School of Mines in London (part of Imperial College from 1907), and also developed a number of important instruments for the rapidly expanding electrical industry. After retiring from teaching, Perry "continued to pursue his interest in spinning tops, a subject on which he had lectured and published often since 1890, and which embodied his wide-ranging concerns from engineering to cosmology" (ODNB).
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...The "Operatives Lecture" of the British Association, Meeting at Leeds, 6th September, 1890. With Numerous Illustrations. Published under the direction of the general literature committee. London, Brighton, & New York: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1901.
Octavo. Original red cloth blocked in gilt and black with an image of a gyroscope on the upper board. Engraved frontispiece and engravings throughout the text. 8 pages of separately paginated publisher’s ads at rear. Ink ownership signature of B. G. Davies to the half title, pencilled remark “No! no!!” to the dedication leaf. Spine slightly rolled, lower corner bumped, cloth a little rubbed and marked with some waviness on the spine, contents tanned in the margins. Very good condition.
Pitt-Rivers, Rosalind & Jamshed R. Tata. | The Thyroid Hormones
£150.00
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First edition, first printing of this key work by one of Britain’s leading biochemists. A beautiful copy in the jacket.
Rosalind Pitt-Rivers earned her PhD in biochemistry in 1939 under the supervision of Sir Charles Harington, whose lab at the National Institute for Medical research she then joined. The Second World War interrupted her career, but in 1950 she returned to Harington’s lab. “This move turned out to be a propitious event in her scientific career. Inspired by Harington's major interest in elucidating the structure of thyroid hormones, she became deeply involved with biochemical research on how what was then thought to be the only thyroid hormone, L-thyroxine (T4), was synthesized in the thyroid gland. In 1951 a young Canadian endocrinologist, Jack Gross, joined Pitt-Rivers as a postdoctoral fellow to discover more about an unidentified iodine-containing compound that he had earlier observed in human and rodent blood. Taking advice from experts in analytical biochemistry at that time working at the NIMR (in particular, A. J. P. Martin, A. T. James, and H. Gordon), Pitt-Rivers and Gross very rapidly identified this unknown compound to be 3,3ʹ,5-triiodothyronine (T3), a report of which was published in The Lancet in 1952. At about the same time a group in Paris at the Collège de France (S. Lissitzky, R. Michel, and J. Roche) identified T3 in the thyroid gland and showed that it was made there as a component of thyroglobulin and secreted into the bloodstream. The following year Gross and Pitt-Rivers were able to demonstrate that a large part of T3 in the blood was derived from T4, and that it was considerably more potent than its precursor, thus establishing T3 to be the principal thyroid hormone. The discovery of triiodothyronine quickly brought Pitt-Rivers international recognition, including her election as a fellow of the Royal Society in 1954” (ODNB).
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...With a Chapter on Diseases of the Thyroid. New York: Pergamon Press, 1959.
Octavo. Original burgundy cloth, titles to spine and upper board gilt. With the dust jacket. 3 plates, of which 1 is double-sided. Faint partial toning of the endpapers. An excellent, fresh copy in the jacket that is lightly rubbed along the extremities with light toning of the spine panel.
Ramsay, William & J. Norman Collie | “The Spectrum of the Radium Emanation”
£75.00
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First edition, the journal issue in original wrappers.
Chemist Sir William Ramsay’s (1852-1916) most important research was on the noble, or inert, gases. He was the first to isolate helium and discovered neon, krypton, xenon, and argon, the latter being the element for which he and John William Strutt, 3rd Baron Rayleigh, were awarded Nobel Prizes in 1905.
In his Nobel lecture Ramsay described on-going spectroscopic work on radium, begun in 1903: “Much work remains to be done on these emanations. In conjunction with Dr. Collie, my colleague, the spectrum of the radium emanation has been mapped. It resembles generally speaking those of the inert gases... It might then be an unstable member of the argon family; there is a vacant place for an element with atomic weight about 162”. Ramsay’s work with radium was not particularly fruitful, and this paper mainly deals with efforts to purify samples and obtain accurate readings.
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...[in] Proceedings of the Royal Society, volume LXXIII, No. 495. London: Harrison and Sons & R. Friedländer & Sohn for the Royal Society, June 22, 1904.
Octavo. Original grey-green wrappers printed in black. 2 folding graphs. Index leaves on onion skin paper loosely inserted. Contents partially unopened, leaf 2K7 clumsily opened with slight loss from the margin. Wrappers toned along the spine and edges, a little rubbing and some nicks and creases along the edges, slight loss from the head of the spine. Very good condition.
Rayleigh, Lord & William Ramsay | Argon, a New Constituent of the Atmosphere
£650.00
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First separate edition, first printing and a very fresh and attractive copy. The discovery of argon led to the Nobel Prize for co-discoverers Lord Rayleigh and William Ramsay.
"Few discoveries have been as dramatic as the discovery of argon in the atmosphere by Lord Rayleigh and William Ramsay, professor of chemistry at University College, London. The discovery of argon involved a bitter public dispute concerning the legitimacy of a chemical element whose most important characteristic was its inertness, and which forced the chemists to reassess the very notion of a chemical element" (ODNB).
Rayleigh had begun work to determine the densities of atmospheric gases in 1882. In 1892 he uncovered a strange discrepancy between the atomic weight of atmospheric nitrogen and nitrogen derived from ammonia. Further experiments led him to the conclusion that the extra weight represented an unknown constituent of the atmosphere, and in 1894 Rayleigh and Ramsay joined forces in an attempt to isolate it.
"Letters were written to The Times criticizing Rayleigh's and Ramsay's work, especially their unwillingness to make public the details of their investigations. Rayleigh and Ramsay kept the details private until they were absolutely certain about the new element because they wished to receive (which they did) the Smithsonian Hodgkins prize for discoveries associated with the atmosphere. The final announcement was made at a meeting of the Royal Society at University College, London, on 31 January 1895, less than a week after Lord Kelvin in his presidential address to the Royal Society had referred to the discovery of the new constituent as the greatest scientific event of the year. Lord Kelvin chaired the meeting to which the councils of both the Chemical and the Physical Society were invited. There were 800 people present when Ramsay read the paper. Rayleigh's comment at the end was quite characteristic: ‘I am not without experience of experimental difficulties, but certainly I have never encountered them in anything like so severe and aggravating a form as in this investigation’ (Rucker, 337)" (ODNB). - Washington D. C.: The Smithsonian Institution, 1896. Large octavo. Original green cloth, titles to upper board gilt, yellow coated endpapers. Corners and tail of spine bumped slightly affecting leaves, else a very fresh copy in excellent condition.
Rydberg, J. R. | Recherches sur la Constitution des Spectra d'Émission des Éléments Chimiques.
£1,000.00
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First edition of this significant work in which Rydberg lays out the empirical formulae governing the frequencies of spectral lines, a precursor to Bohr’s development of the quantum theory. A handsomely bound copy in excellent condition.
Johannes Rydberg (1854-1919) was a Swedish physicist at Lund University who studied atomic masses and electromagnetic radiation; inspired by Mendeleev’s periodic table, he was convinced that the electromagnetic spectra emitted by atoms could provide insight into atomic structure and theory. “Notwithstanding the imperfect spectroscopic tables then at his disposal, Rydberg discovered most of the important properties of series spectra, including the relation between corresponding series in the spectra of related elements, and foreshadowed discoveries which were made later, when experimental work has sufficiently advanced. Some of the features noted by Rydberg were observed about the same time by Kayser and Runge, but his work had the special merit of connecting different series in the spectrum of the same element into one system, which could be represented by a set of simple formulae having but few adjustable constants. He especially insisted that the hydrogen constant, now generally called the ‘Rydberg constant,’ should appear in all series and, apart from slight variations from element to element suggested by the theoretical work of Bohr, nearly all subsequent attempts to improve the representation series have involved this supposition, and have had Rydberg's formula as a basis.” (Nature obituary, January 24, 1920). Rydberg’s work was justified and expanded upon by Neils Bohr’s development of the quantum model of atomic structure in 1913, and Bohr was able to use his own theory to derive Rydberg’s results, providing confirmation of both.
This uncommon publication represents the culmination of Rydberg’s work. It “mapped out Rydberg’s total approach with remarkable clarity. He conceived of the spectrum of an element as composed of the superposition of three different types of series - one in which the lines were comparatively sharp, one in which the lines were more diffuse, and a third that he called the principle series even though they consisted mostly of lines in the ultraviolet. The first lines were located in the visible spectrum and were usually the most intense. The members of each series might be single, double, triple, or of higher multiplicity. Any particular elementary spectrum might contain any number (even zero) of a series of each of the basic types. While Rydberg observed and measured some spectral lines on his own, he was not particularly noted as an experimental physicist and did not publish any of his experimental investigations or spectroscopic measurements. Most of the data he needed were already available in the voluminous literature. While T. R. Thalen and Bernhard Hasselberg, Rydberg’s major Swedish contemporaries in spectral studies, concentrated upon accurate measurements of the spectra of the elements, Rydberg’s major spectral contributions were to theory and mathematical form, and those to form were the ones of enduring value” (Dictionary of Scientific Biography, vol. 12, p. 42).
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Kongl. SV. Vet. Akademiens Handlinger Band 23. No. II. Stockholm: Kongl. Boktryckeriet. P. A. Norstedt & Söner, 1890. Tall quarto (300 x 230 mm). Recent burgundy quarter morocco, marbled boards, titles to spine gilt. Title page just a little toned. Excellent condition.
Scharrer, Ernst & Berta | Neuroendocrinology.
£165.00
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First edition, first printing and a very attractive copy of this “seminal, comprehensive monograph” by the founders of neuroendocrinology (Ogilvie, Biographical Dictionary of Women in Science, p. 1158). From the library of prominent American psychologist Henry Guze, with his ownership inscription on the front endpapers.
“There are very few scientists whose discoveries have marked the advent of a new discipline. Berta Scharrer was one of these pioneers. Her scientific career was crowned with great success. The concept of neurosecretion (the storage, synthesis and release of hormones from neurons) developed by Ernst and Berta Scharrer between 1928 and 1937 formed the foundation for contemporary neuroendocrinology... Today we know that secretory nerve cells are widely distributed over the whole nervous system” and “serve to maintain the organism and preserve the species” (Ogilvie). Scharrer was the recipient of honorary degrees from eleven institutions, including Harvard, and “among her numerous medals and prizes were the Kraepelin Gold Medal of the Max Planck Society, the Schleiden Mdal of the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina, and the National Medal of the Science of the United States of America” (Ogilvie).
The previous owner of this copy, Henry Guze, “specialized in psychosomatic illness, schizophrenia and disorders of sexual behavior. He was a founder of The American Academy of Psychotherapists and the Society for Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis and co‐founder and former president of the Society for the Scientific Study of Sex” (New York Times obituary, July 4, 1970).
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New York & London: Columbia University Press, 1963.
Octavo. Original teal cloth, title to spine in gilt on light blue ground, publisher’s logo to upper board in blind. With the dust jacket. 3 plates, illustrations and diagrams within the text. Ownership inscriptions of Henry Guze to the front endpapers. An excellent copy in the jacket that is lightly rubbed and faded along the spine panel, with two short closed tears to the upper panel and light dampstain affecting the lower panel.
Seibert, Florence B. | Pebbles on the Hill of a Scientist
£250.00
- First and only edition of this autobiography of the biochemist who was the first to produce purified tuberculin for use in studying and treating tuberculosis. Presentation copy inscribed by the author to a prominent nursing administrator on the front free endpaper, “To Anna Wolf and Eleanor Stewart, esteemed friends, Florence B. Seibert”. And with a photo of the author tipped-in with tape on the front pastedown, inscribed on the verso in pencil “Dr. Florence B. Seibert ‘73, friend who researched on all forms of cancer”.
Biochemist Florence Seibert (1897-1991) was a productive and highly regarded scientist who worked in a number of areas and received numerous awards, including a Guggenheim Fellowship.
As a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Chicago during the early 1920s she made her first breakthrough, “a method of eliminating bacterial contamination that was known to occur during the creation of solutions meant for vaccinations and injections. Patients could experience sudden fevers or illness during or after an injection or intravenous treatment. Such afflictions, Seibert discovered, were most often caused by bacterial contamination of the distilled water used to make the solutions. She was able to eliminate this contamination using a special apparatus and procedure she created for this purpose. This would be a great boon later not only for administering drugs but also for making blood transfusions safer during surgery” (Lemelson-MIT biography).
But Seibert’s most significant work was on tuberculosis, particularly her improvements to Robert Koch’s skin test for the infection. “Koch’s method was notoriously inaccurate, for the evaporated solution used in the test contained numerous impurities. Even people with a serious case of tuberculosis sometimes failed to get a positive test. Seibert worked for ten years on methods of isolating pure tuberculin by filtration, by using a guncotton membrane of a specific thickness. The result was a creamy white powder which was the purified protein from the tuberculosis bacillus, known as PPD. Never patenting the process (which would have made her rich), she furnished the National Tuberculosis Association with a large quantity of pure tuberculin” (Ogilvie, Biographical Dictionary of Women in Science, p. 1173).
It’s likely that one of the recipients of this copy was the prominent nursing instructor and educational administrator Anna Dryden Wolf (1890-1985), who served as director of the Johns Hopkins Hospital School of Nursing. She and Seibert probably met during the late 1920s when Wolf was on the faculty of the University of Chicago. In addition to laying the groundwork for the Johns Hopkins School of Nursing, “[Wolf] played a leadership role in numerous nursing professional organizations, such as the American Red Cross, Florence Nightingale International Foundation, National League of Nursing Education, and National Nursing Council. She also served as an advisor to government agencies such as the US Public Health Service, Veterans Affairs, and War Manpower Commission” (Johns Hopkins Medical Archives, Wolf papers finding aid). -
St. Petersburg, FL: for the author by St. Petersburg Printing Company, 1968.
Octavo. Original turquoise cloth, titles to spine and upper board gilt. With the dust jacket. 12 pages of integral illustrations from photographs. Spine rolled, cloth very lightly rubbed at the tips, some spots on the top edge not affecting the contents. An excellent copy in the jacket that is a little rubbed, toned, and marked, with some nicks and short splits.
Taylor, Clara Mae | Food Values in Shares and Weights
£35.00
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Third printing, published the year after the first. With the ownership inscription, pencilled notes, and December 1944 report card of Eva Bernice Simmons, a student at the North Carolina College for Negroes, now North Carolina Central University.
Author Clara Mae Taylor (1989-?) attended Columbia University Teacher’s College and then taught at the Rhode Island Teacher’s College and at her alma mater. She earned her PhD in nutrition science at age forty after spending a year in research at Oxford. “During World War II, Taylor directed a research project under the Department of Agriculture that investigated energy metabolism in children. She also studied metabolism in women at different ages. Her animal experiments on white rats and guinea pigs included dietary studies, an investigation of different levels of ascorbic acid on reproduction, and studies on lactation and survival rates. During the war and the immediate post-war period, she served as a nutritional consultant to two popular women’s magazines, Woman’s Home Companion and Parents Magazine” (Ogilvie, Biographical Dictionary of Women in Science, p. 1269).
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New York: The Macmillan Company, 1943.
Tall quarto. Original grey cloth, titles to spine and upper board in black. Colour frontispiece. Contemporary inked ownership inscription to the front free endpaper, pencilled notes in the same hand to the front pastedown. Cloth rubbed and with a few small marks and spots, spine and edge of upper board tanned, edges of contents spotted. A very good copy.
Tonelli, Giorgio | La Pensée Philosophique de Maupertuis
£50.00
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First edition, first impression. A very attractive copy in fresh condition.
This important study analyses the philosophical milieu and influences of Maupertuis, “one of the greatest scientists and original thinkers of the 18th century. His contributions to mathematics (the Principle of Least Action), and his refutation of preformationist theories alone would have justified his pre-eminence. However, of particular interest was his study and interpretation of pedigrees of genetic traits, the application of the concept of probability to genetic problems, the introducing of experimental breeding as a means of studying the transmission of inherited traits in animals, and his proposed theories of inheritance, all ideas which were far ahead of their time” (Emery, “Pierre Louis Moreau de Maupertuis )1698-1759)”, Journal of Medical Genetics 25, 1988).
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...son Milieu et ses Sources. Édition Posthume par Claudio Cesa. Hildesheim, Zürich & New York: Georg Olms, 1987.
Quarto. Original tan and white boards with text in black and white. Minor bump to the lower corner. Excellent condition.
Urey, Harold | Archive of correspondence with astronomer Arthur Beer
£1,250.00
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An archive of correspondence between astronomer Arthur Beer and Nobel Prize winning chemist Harold Urey regarding the latter’s contribution to Vistas in Astronomy.
Beer (1900-1980) was born in Richenberg, Bohemia (later Czechoslovakia), and educated in Austria and Germany. He worked as an astronomer at Breslau University, where he studied binary stars, and at the German Maritime Observatory. He also wrote newspaper columns and was responsible for developing one of the first scientific radio programmes, Aus Natur und Technik. Beer escaped from Germany in 1934, assisted by Einstein, who wrote him a public letter of recommendation, and spent the rest of his life in the UK. He worked at the Cambridge Solar Physics Observatory and at the Kew Observatory, and became a member of the Royal Astronomical Society. Beer’s most significant contribution to science was as the founding editor of Vistas in Astronomy, a “voluminous and thorough survey of present-day astronomy” in two volumes, conceived as a Festschrift celebrating the 70th birthday of astrophysicist Frederick J. M. Stratton, under whom he had served in Cambridge. The resulting volumes were so impressive that it was continued first as an annual book and then a quarterly journal.
American chemist Harold Urey (1893-1981) did key work on atomic and molecular structures, particularly hydrogen isotopes. This led him to the discovery of deuterium, for which he was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1934. During the Second World War he led the Manhattan Project’s branch at Columbia University, where he applied his knowledge of isotope separation techniques to the problem of isolating of pure uranium 235 on an industrial scale. After the war he worked at the Institute for Nuclear Studies at the University of Chicago. In 1958 Urey moved to the University of California, San Diego, where he did groundbreaking work on the origins of life on Earth, conducting a laboratory simulation of the conditions on the early Earth and proving that they were ideal for the production of cellular building blocks such as amino acids.
The correspondence present here consists of five letters from Urey, mainly on practical issues connected with his contribution to Beer’s book. In the first, on September 10th, 1952, he replies to Beer’s request for submissions, apologising for taking so long to reply as “I have not been able to think of a subkect to write about. I am leaving for Europe on the 14th of September and hope to visit Cambridge about October 15th. If it isn’t too late by that time perhaps we can discuss the question then. In the meantime, I will turn this over in my mind and try to think of something that I might contribute to the book.” On January 8th the following year he writes, “At last the paper for the Stratton volume!... I wish it were a better paper. If you do not wish to publish it I shall not be offended at all. There are quite a few notes and I believe references and notes are more easily read if placed at the bottom of the page. But perhaps your rules are all made long ago.” Later that month Urey sends short note to confirm receipt of the document, and in July he asks that the proofs be mailed to him in Stockholm. The final letter, dated by Beer in pencil as postmarked July 31st, 1953, discusses the terms he has chosen for the index (”I have underlined [in the returned proof, not present here] expressions indicating topics for the index... on the margins I have written additional suggestions” and relates that the illustrations had not arrived yet when he left for the states, but that “I believe the figures can be assumed to be all right”.
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Chicago, 1952-53. Including 3 typed letters signed (one with the signature removed for reproduction in Vistas in Astronomy) and 2 autograph letters signed by Urey. Housed in Beer’s tan paper folder with “Urey” in ink on the cover. Just a little creasing to some pieces. Excellent condition.
Weeks, Mary Elvira | The Discovery of the Elements I-XVII
£250.00
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A rare and unusual set of the first seventeen parts of the classic The Discovery of the Elements, published as twenty-one articles in the Journal of Chemical Education in 1932 and 33 before it was republished in book form. Here collected and bound together in a contemporary, ready-made cloth binder with manuscript label.
Author Mary Elvira Weeks (1892 - ?) was a physical and analytical chemist at the University of Kansas. “She worked on the atmospheric oxidation of solutions of sodium sulfite in ultraviolet light, the role of hydrogen ion concentration in the precipitation of calcium and magnesium carbonates and the use of oxidation-reduction indicators in the determination of iron. She was also interested in the history of chemistry, particularly in the discovery of the elements” (Ogilvie, Biographical Dictionary of Women in Science, p. 1358).
Weeks “combined her dual interest in chemistry and languages to prepare a series of 21 articles in the Journal of Chemical Education in 1932-1933. The popularity of the series encouraged the Chemical Education Publishing Company of Easton, Pennsylvania, to collect the series and publish it as a paperbound book, Discovery of the Elements (1934). The articles and the resulting books were lavishly illustrated with pictures from [her colleague Frank B.] Dains’ collection, subsequently supplemented by pictures collected by Weeks. The book ultimately went though seven editions; the last in 1968 with the co-authorship of Henry M. Leicester. The book was, in many respects, a history of chemistry developed around the theme of discovering elements” (American Chemical Society, Division of the History of Chemistry biography).
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...[from] the Journal of Chemical Education volume 9, number 1 - volume 9, number 12. Journal of Chemical Education, 1932-33.
17 articles removed from the Journal of Chemical Education and bound together in green cloth ready-made binder by Baschaga. Paper label to the upper board with manuscript title in an early-twentieth century hand. Black and white illustrations throughout the texts. Endpapers a little toned, binder lightly rubbed at the extremities. Excellent condition.
Weinberg, Steven | The Discovery of Subatomic Particles
£175.00
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First edition, first printing of this important popular history of particle physics by “the preeminent public intellectual of fundamental physics”, Steven Weinberg (1933-2021) (Arkani-Hamad, “How Steven Weinberg Transformed Physics and Physicists, Quanta magazine, August 11, 2021). Uncommon in nice condition in the dust jacket.
Weinberg was one of the most important physicists of the 20th and 21st centuries, and was awarded the 1979 Nobel Prize for the electroweak theory, which unified two of the fundamental forces: electromagnetism and the nuclear weak force. “Working separately, Dr. Abdus Salam, a Pakistani theoretical physicist, came to the same conclusions as Dr. Weinberg. Their model became known as the Weinberg-Salam Theory. It was revolutionary, not only for proposing the unification of the electromagnetic and weak forces, but also for creating a classification system of masses and charges for all fundamental particles, thereby forming the basis of the Standard Model, which includes all the forces except gravity” (New York Times obituary, July 29, 2021).
“Though he had the respect, almost awe, of his colleagues for his scientific abilities and insights, he also possessed a rare ability among scientists to communicate and explain abstruse scientific ideas to the public. He was a sought-after speaker, and he wrote several popular books about science, notably The First Three Minutes: A Modern View of the Origin of the Universe (1977) (NYT). As Weinberg explains in the introduction, The Discovery of Subatomic Particles, “grew out of a course that I gave at Harvard in the spring of 1980... to engage students who were not assumed to have any prior training in mathematics or physics in learning about the great achievements of twentieth-century physics”. It “covers the discovery of the fundamental particles that make up all ordinary atoms: the electron, the proton, and the neutron” and was written “for readers who may not be familiar with classical physics, but are willing to pick up enough of it as they go along to be able to understand the rich tangle of ideas and experiments that make up the history of twentieth century physics”.
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New York & San Francisco: Scientific American Library, an imprint of W. H. Freeman and Company, 1983.
Quarto. Original blue cloth, titles to spine in silver, grey endpapers. With the dust jacket. Double-page frontispiece and illustrations throughout the text. An excellent copy – the cloth and contents fresh – in the jacket that is lightly toned with minor creasing and short splits at the edges, some scratches primarily affecting the upper panel, and a small dark spot on the illustration on the upper panel.
Wick, Frances G. & Louise S. McDowell | “A Preliminary Study of the Luminescence of the Uranyl Salts under Cathode Ray Excitation"
£150.00
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First edition, the journal issue in original wrappers, of a significant paper by two early professional female chemists.
Frances Wick (1875-1941) became interested in physics after teaching a high school course in the subject. In 1904 she enrolled at Cornell where her mentors, Edward L. Nichols and Ernest Merrit, were supportive of women students and introduced her to what would become her primary interest, the study of luminescence. After graduating she taught in women’s colleges, did research at General Electric, Harvard, Cornell, Cambridge, Berlin, and Vienna, and worked on gun sights and radio during the First World War.
Wick “took part in comprehensive studies of the fluorescence of uranium compounds coordinated by Nicholas and funded by the Carnegie Institution. During the remainder of her career, Wick investigated the luminescence produced by various agents, such as cathode, X, and radium rays; heat; and friction; as well as the effects of previous exposure to radiation on thermoluminescence… Wick was known as an inspiring, enthusiastic teacher who loved her research. She was well respected for her extensive experimental research on luminescence” and “was a Fellow of the American Physical Society, the Optical Society of America, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science”, as well as a member of numerous other research and teaching associations (Ogilvie, Biographical Dictionary of Women in Science, p. 1375).
Wicks’ co-author, Louise McDowell (1876-1966) also attended Cornell as a chemistry student, and the two became good friends. Her dissertation on the electrical properties of selenium “was one of the early studies of semiconductors. She investigated crystal detectors for the Signal Corps during World War I. Her determination of power loss in dielectrics provided much useful information on properties of different insulators, especially glass” (Ogilvie, p. 866). With Wick she studied luminescence and during the Second World War she worked on radar at Harvard for the U.S. office of Scientific Research and Development. Like Wick, she was also a respected and devoted teacher and member of numerous professional societies.
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...[in] The Physical Review, volume XI, number 6. Lancaster, PA & Ithaca, NY: The American Physical Society, June 1918.
Octavo. Original green wrappers printed in black. 1 plate, 3 leaves of ads at rear. Spine and edges of wrappers tanned, wear along the spine with a closed tear in the upper wrapper near the tail and loss from the head of the spine. Very good condition.
[Embrace the Base] Greenham Common Women's Peace Camp Invite Women to Take Part in an International Action
£1,750.00
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A rare poster advertising Embrace the Base, one of the key mass actions at the Greenham Common Women’s Peace Camp. We have been able to locate only two copies in institutional collections, at the LSE Women’s Library and the Glasgow Women’s Library.
The Greenham Common protest was established in September of 1981 by the Welsh group Women for Life on Earth, who were opposed to the deployment of nuclear tipped cruise missiles at the site. What was initially planned as a single march became a permanent protest camp, one of the most significant and longest lasting women’s protests of the 20th century. In February 1982, for political reasons, the camp was made women only, and the following month they engaged in their first blockade of the base. Embrace the Base was their next major action. Taking place on December 12th & 13th, 1982, it saw 30,000 women from across from across the UK—drawn by chain letter, word of mouth, and posters such as this one—join hands to surround the nine mile perimeter fence. This copy of the poster seems to have been used in Birmingham, and includes instructions for obtaining coach tickets at the “Peace Centre (opp New Street Station)”, as well as local activist contact details, in marker pen.
As well as being an early and rare example of Greenham Common ephemera, this poster is particularly interesting in that is features a spider web, “a frequently reoccurring symbol in Greenham women’s cultural imaginary” because of its mythological and symbolic associations. “The metaphor of ‘building a web’ and being connected to each other in a ‘web-like structure’ populated Greenham women’s speech and writing. Alison Young describes Greenham women’s reclamation of the spider as revolving primarily around the notion of the spider’s web. She writes that the web ‘shows connections between women or between ideas; it can be begun at any point or at any time; each single strand is weak and fragile, yet when interwoven it is strong, beautiful and efficient’ (1990, 38). In line with Young’s reading, Roseneil writes that, ‘the web was a symbol of women's collective power, seemingly fragile, but actually very strong’” (1999, 179, ft39)” (Feigenbaum, Tactics and Technology: Cultural Resistance at the Greenham Women’s Peace Camp, PhD thesis, McGill University, April 2008).
The Greenham Common camp had no hierarchy, and its nature was defined by the thousands of individual women who visited when they could or lived permanently onsite for years. The activists engaged in non-violent resistance by disrupting movement in and out of the gates, cutting down portions of the fence, and trespassing on military property, and they endured frequent police raids, arrests, and evictions. A large number of the protesters were middle aged and older; they considered themselves ordinary mothers and working women, and made a point of the fact were opposed to nuclear weapons for deeply personal reasons. Their gender was crucial to their message: “a woman’s place was not in the home, but at a protest. Women could use their identity as carers and mothers to say, this is about the future safety of our children. We weaponised traditional notions of femininity” (Suzanne Moore, “How the Greenham Common Protest Changed Lives, The Guardian, March 20th, 2017).
“Greenham was powerful. It taught my generation about collective action, about protest as spectacle, a way of life, incredibly hard but sometimes joyous. Still the image of resistance for me is not the famous photograph of a striking miner confronting a policeman at Orgreave, it is the picture of Greenham women dancing in 1982: witchy, unarmed women dancing on a missile silo. This magical, powerful image shows how the peace camp both played on traditional images of the feminine and then subverted them. Greenham created an alternative world of unstoppable women. It changed lives.” (Moore, 2017).
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...to Stop the Siting of Cruise Missiles Anywhere in Europe. December 12th & 13th. Embrace the Base on Sunday. Close the Base on Monday.
[England, [1982].
Mechanically printed poster (420mm x 580mm). Professionally mounted, framed and glazed using archival materials. White text and illustration of a missile caught in a spider’s web superimposed over a grey and red photograph of the mushroom cloud over Nagasaki. Marker pen notes at the bottom of the poster give contact details and instructions for travelling to the camp by bus from Birmingham. Vertical and horizontal creases from folding, a little light rubbing. Very good condition.