Whewell’s Gazette
Your weekly digest of all the best of
Internet history of science, technology and medicine
Editor in Chief: The Ghost of William Whewell
Volume #38
Monday 09 March 2015
EDITORIAL:
Whewell’s Gazette your weekly #histSTM links list has been around for just thirty-eight issues counting this one but 6 March saw the three hundred and fiftieth birthday of the world’s first (maybe) and oldest (definitely) science journal the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, which has been celebrating its birthday in real style. There are free open access birthday editions of both the A edition (mathematical and physical sciences) and the B edition (the life sciences) with lots of history of science content so get stuck in and download all of those goodies.
The Royal Society: Publishing Blog: Free access to 350 years of science publishing
University of Toronto: Exhibit – 350 Years of Scientific Discovery: The Royal Society’ Philosophical Transactions 6–31 March
The Guardian: 350 years of the scientific journal: celebrating the anniversary of Philosophical Transactions
Youtube: Science Stories: Publishing 350
Yovisto: The Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society
Quotes of the week:
“Describe your methodology” – Well, I read things and then think about them. That good enough? @LeapingRobot
“Judging by how hard it is to get some people to do either of those things, it sounds pretty rigorous.” @TryingBiology
Women’s History Month – International Women’s Day
Google Doodle IWD
Sunday was International Women’s Day and March is also Women’s History Month so this edition of Whewell’s Gazette starts with a special women’s section.
A Don’s Life: International Women’s Day for historians
PLOS Blogs: Pentimento: Revealing the Women Obscured in Science History
Trowelblazers: Women in archaeology, geology, and palaeontology
Wikipedia: WikiProject Women’s History/NIH Women’s History Month Edit-a-Thon 2015
Cemistry lab at Bedford College in 1874.
Photograph: Archives, Royal Holloway, University of London
Source: The Guardian
Conciatore: Women in Alchemy
The Recipes Project: “The Alchemist’s Desire”: Recipes for Health and Beauty from Caterina Sforza
Rosetta Stones: Women of the Geoblogosphere: Follow Them! For They are Awesome
News ALL Day: Mapping history’s ‘invisible’ women
Voices of the Manhattan Project: Nancy Bartlit’s Interview
Trowelblazers: Tina Negus: An eye for the Ediacaran
Royal Holloway College botany class in 1937.
Photograph: Archives, Royal Holloway, University of London
Source: The Guardian
The Conversation: You probably haven’t heard of these five amazing women scientists – so pay attention
How We Get To Next: The Forgotten Story of the Women Who Built One of London’s Most Iconic Bridges
Advances in the History of Psychology: Women’s History Month @ Psychology’s Feminist Voices
The Sloane Letters Blog: Choosing the Countryside: Women Health and Power in the Eighteenth Century
The Guardian: International Women’s Day 2015: history of women in science – in pictures
Bedford College chemistry lab in 1920.
Photograph: Archives, Royal Holloway, University of London
Source: The Guardian
AMNH: Women’s History Month at the Museum
TrowelBlazers: 5 TrowelBlazers You Should Have Heard of
Brain Pickings: Pioneering 19th-Century Astronomer Maria Mitchell on Education and Women in Science
io9: These 17 Women Changed The Face of Physics
flickr: Women in Science
“NOTHING IN LIFE IS TO BE FEARED. IT IS ONLY TO BE UNDERSTOOD” – Marie Curie
Birthday of the week:
Gerardus Mercator born 5 March 1512
Gerardus Mercator’s 503rd Birthday
Google Doodle
The Renaissance Mathematicus: The “first” Atlas
The Renaissance Mathematicus: It’s not the Mercator projection; it’s the Mercator-Wright projection!
History Today: The Birth of Gerardus Mercator
PHYSICS & ASTRONOMY:
Early Modern Experimental Philosophy: Astrology and the novatores, part 3
AHF: John R. Dunning
BSHS Travel Guide: Harvard College Observatory
Photograph of the Harvard Computers, a group of women who worked under Edward Charles Pickering at the Harvard College Observatory. The photograph was taken on 13 May 1913 in front of Building C, which was then the newest building at the Observatory. The image was discovered in an album which had once belonged to Annie Jump Cannon. Image courtesy of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. Back row (L to R): Margaret Harwood (far left), Mollie O’Reilly, Edward C. Pickering, Edith Gill, Annie Jump Cannon, Evelyn Leland (behind Cannon), Florence Cushman, Marion Whyte (behind Cushman), Grace Brooks. Front row: Arville Walker, unknown (possibly Johanna Mackie), Alta Carpenter, Mabel Gill, Ida Woods (Source: Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. This media file is in the public domain because its copyright has expired).
AHF: Manhattan Project Spotlight: The Groves Family
Brown University Library: Capturing the Transit of Venus
AHF: Innovation Through Teamwork
Nature Physics: Physics, physicists and the bomb
Phys.org Aboriginal legends an untapped record of natural history written in the stars
University of Cambridge Museums: Sedwick Museum meteorite helps unravel mysteries of Solar System
Cosmos: The physicist who inflated the universe
EXPLORATION and CARTOGRAPHY:
British Library: Maps and views blog: Robert Adam and the King’s Topographical Collection
![Robert Adam [Elevation and plan of a proposed arch at Hyde Park Corner, November 1778] Maps K Top 27.26-c-2. Source: British Library](https://whewellsghost.files.wordpress.com/2015/03/6a00d8341c464853ef01bb07fb44c9970d-800wi.jpg)
Robert Adam [Elevation and plan of a proposed arch at Hyde Park Corner, November 1778] Maps K Top 27.26-c-2.
Source: British Library
MEDICINE:
Archives Hub: Continuity of Care – The Royal Scottish National Hospital
The Chronicle of Higher Education: Big–Data Project on 1918 Flu Reflects Key Role Of Humanists
Early Modern Medicine: The Stinging of a Wasp
MHL: London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine
Lapham’s Quarterly: Contagion: A brief history of malaria, leprosy, and smallpox
The Recipes Project: Scratching “The Itch Infalable”: Johanna St. John’s Anti-Itch Cure
ChoM News: From the MHL: What Can We Learn from Hospital Reports?
The Lancet: Exhibition review: Celebrating the remarkable life of John Radcliffe
Yovisto: John Fothergill – Physician and Gardener
EARTH & LIFE SCIENCES:
Source: Unknown
The Guardian: How hunting with wolves helped humans outsmart the Neanderthals
Earth Observatory: Svante Arrhenius (1859-1927)
The Crestone Eagle: Gray & Hooker’s Blanca Peak Expedition: The Asian connection
NYAM: Proposed 1920s Orphanage Study Just One Example in History of Scientific Racism
Notches: Eugenics and Intersex: The consequences of defining “normal” bodies
Yovisto: John Murray and the Oceanography
John Murray
(1841 – 1914)
The Royal Institution: John Tyndall discovered the basis of global warming. Why has history forgotten him?
The Guardian: Sexing up the human pheromone story: How a corporation started a scientific myth
Source: Unknown
Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser: Call for plaque to recognize Dorking home of evolution scientist
Diseases of Modern Life: Inside Passengers: The Girl’s Own Paper looks inside the body
Luke and Belinda explore the stomach.
Natural History Apostilles: Predator-prey selection between dogs and goats observed in 1758
Natural History Apostilles: More observations on dogs and goats from the 16th century
Skulls in the Stars: Michael Faraday and the waterspouts (1814)
Coincidence?
Greg Jenner: Animals on the Wall: Cave Art & Stone Age Pets
Canadian Geographic: HMS Erebus exploration set to continue
CHEMISTRY:
Medium: A short-but-gruesome history of the match
image by flickr user Jim Chambers CC BY-NC-SA
TECHNOLOGY:
Medievalist.net: Top 10 Strange Weapons of the Middle Ages
Dr Alun Withey: Zounds how you scape! Being shaved in Georgian Britain
Yovisto: Walter Bruch and the PAL Color Television System
Ptak Science Books: Tiny Sky Nets for Attacking Aircraft, 1925
Source: Ptak Science Books
IEEE Spectrum: Eben Upton: The Raspberry Pi Pioneer
Ptak Scientific Books: Visual Display of Data: German Military Weakness, 1929
Conciatore: Filigrana
Ptak Science Books: Cut-Away Schematic: British Vickers Medium Tank, 1925
Yovisto: William Oughtred and the Slide Rule
The Atlantic: The Failed Attempt to Destroy GPS
META – HISTORIOGRAPHY, THEORY, RESOURCES and OTHER:
WCM 1: Open Notebook History
The many-headed monster: Who were ‘the people’ in early modern England? Part II: Some evidence from manuscripts
New Statesman: No one was “gay” in the 18th century: why we must not rewrite history with today’s terms
Metamorphoses in Art & Science
Giving to Princeton: Gift Establishes the Thomas M. Siebel History of Science Professorship
OUP Blog: Creating a constructive cultural narrative for science
Islam & Science: Lessons learned from the ‘Earth does not rotate’ debate
New Statesman: Wellcome Collection: raising the cultural profile of science
Storify: Hans Sloane and His Books
LabLit.com: A bitter pill to swallow Obituary Carl Djerassi
Chemistry World: Are you sitting comfortably?
PRI: How JFK made NASA his secret weapon in the fight for civil rights in America
Clyde Foster processes telemetry at the Marshall Space Flight Center in 1965 in a photo that appeared in Ebony magazine. As a NASA employee, Foster was a leader in getting jobs and advancing engineering education for African Americans. Credit: Courtesy of Don Rutledge ©
Wellcome Library: UK Medical Heritage Library
Science Museum: Churchill’s Scientists: Inside the exhibition
CHoM News: New Exhibit: Foundations for the History of Women in Medical Oral History
Royal College of Physicians: Exhibition: Chemistry in the garden: paintings by Nina Krauzewicz 3 March–31 July 2015
My medieval foundry: Books, blogs and communicating knowledge to the public
Ether Wave Propaganda: Rational Action: The Blog
Forbes: Ideas That Deserve to Die … But Probably Won’t
ESOTERIC:
io9: 10 Famous Scientists Who Held Surprising Supernatural Beliefs
Ptak Science Books: A Dominance of Observations from our Future Skeleton (1635)
History Matters: Happy 200th Deathday Franz Anton Mesmer
Chemistry World: Alchemy on the page
homunculus: Alchemy on the page (extended version)
D News: Edison’ ‘lost’ Idea: A Device to Hear to the Dead [sic]
BOOK REVIEWS:
Science Book a Day: Interviews Gabriel Finkelstein
Popular Science: Science in Wonderland – Melanie Keene
History Today: Infinitesimal
Book List Online: Eye of the Beholder
National Geographic: Is Islam Hostile to Science?
Somatosphere: Book Forum – Warwick Anderson and Ian R. Mackay’s “Intolerant Bodies”
Science Book a Day: 10 Great Books on Medicine
Reviews in History: The Politics of Hospital Provision in Early Twentieth-Century Britain
TLS: Enter John Aubrey
Science Book a Day: The Chimp and the River: How AIDS Emerged from an African Forest
Some Beans: Engineering Empires
The Artic Book Review: Unravelling the Franklin Mystery: Inuit Testimony
BSHS Dingle Prize Short List:
University of Chicago Press: Earth’s Deep History
Yale University Press: Voyaging in Strange Seas
Harper Collins Publishers: Finding Longitude
OUP: The Man in the Monkeynut Coat
One World Publishing: The History of Medicine: A Beginners Guide
NEW BOOKS:
Johns Hopkins University Press: Exploration and Engineering: The Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the Quest for Mars
Pikaia: Eternal Ephemera: Adaption and the Origin of Species…
THEATRE:
FILM:
The Science and Entertainment Lab: Rise of Women? Screening Female Scientists
Promotional shots of Cornelia (Judy Greer) and Ellie (Keri Russell) show ‘Dawn of the Planet of the Apes’ only named female characters comforting a baby
TELEVISION:
SLIDE SHARE:
VIDEOS:
North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences: George Beccaloni & Ruth Benny – Wallace Treasures fro…
Youtube: Why do medical students have to study the history of medicine
RADIO:
PODCASTS:
The Guardian: Steven Weinberg on the history of science
Naked Scientists: Eureka! Experiments that Changed the World
15 Minute History: Episode 65: Darwinism and the Scopes “Monkey Trial”
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow: Glasgow History of Medicine Group – Spring Meetings 2015
CRASSH: The Total Archive: Dreams of Universal Knowledge from the Encyclopaedia to Big Data 19-20 March
Discovery Museum Newcastle: CfP: IET Conference on the History of Engineering 6 June 2015
University of London: Women’s Studies Group 1558–1837: Annual Workshop: ‘What is the Place of Aphra Behn in Restoration Culture?’ 9 May 2015
IU Bloomington Newsroom: Historian of science Naomi Oreskes to present Patten Lectures at IU Bloomington
Cambridge University: Biological Discourses: the Language of Science & Literature around 1900 10-11 April 2015
Institute of Historical Research: Empty Spaces Conference Program for April 10, 2015
Canvas Network: Free Online Course: Warfare and Weapons in Ancient Egypt 6 April–5 May 2015
XVI UNIVERSEUM NETWORK MEETING University Heritage and Cultural Engagement of European Universities National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece, 11‐13 June 2015
Aarhus University Centre for Science Studies: CfP: Workshop “1970s: Turn of an era in the history of science?” 14–15 September 2015
AIP: MOOC: Reimagining Einstein for Students and Teachers: The Einstein Revolution
Museum of the History of Science: Hooked on Invention: 14 March 2015
Yale University: Joint Atlantic Seminar for the History of Biology 27-28 March 2015
The Linnean Society: From Cabinet to Internet: Digitising Natural History and Medical Manuscripts 27-28 April 2015
Royal Museums Greenwich: Against Captain’s Orders: After Hours Exclusives (members’ event) 2 April–27 August 2015
Advances in the History of Psychology: CfP: 4S Open Panel on STS, Technology & Psychology 11-14 November 2015 Denver Co.
Royal Geographical Society and Bournemouth University: The Hero’s Journey of Alfred Russel Wallace in Southeast Asia 10 March 2015 Poole
LOOKING FOR WORK:
University of Huddersfield: Location, Location, Location: The Gott Collection, Yorkshire landscapes and Connected Communities PhD studentship at the University of Huddersfield
University of Wuppertal: At the „Interdisciplinary Centre for Science and Technology Studies: Normative and historical foundations“ (IZWT) of the University of Wuppertal at the earliest date possible the position of an Assistant Professor
University of Glasgow: The Leverhulme Trust: “Collections” Scholarship
University of Cambridge: Two Postdoctoral Research Associates in the Early Modern Period (History of Art and History of Science)
Science Museum Group: ACD-SCM-MAR15 – Assistant Content Developers x2, Contemporary Science
IHR: Scouloudi Historical Awards: Research Awards
University of Cambridge: Research Associate in History of Modern Science (Fixed Term)
Flight Global Jobs: Historian – RAF Northolt, London
University of Leeds: AHRC Postdoctoral Researcher Project: ‘Electrifying the country house: taking stories of innovation to new audiences’
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