Part 6

F. W. Preston, “The first big American telescope mirror, John Peate, his lens,” Bulletin of the American Ceramic Society, 1936, vol. 15, pp. 129-152. Hereafter cited as Preston.

The circumstances of Peate’s life and ministerial career are from Preston, supplemented by Dr. Peate’s service record, provided by the Erie Conference of the Methodist Church. Dr. Preston’s prime sources are: J. N. Fradenburgh, History of the Erie Conference, Oil City, Pa., 1907, vol. 2, pp. 204-211; obituary notice by R. N. Stubbs in Minutes of the Erie Conference, pl. publ. 1903, p. 90. Other data were obtained by Preston through interviews and letters, all cited in detail in the article.

From information provided by Robert Barr, acting secretary of Oberlin College, February 15, 1960. The college records show a John Peate from Buffalo enrolled in the preparatory department in 1842-43 and 1844-45. The Encyclopedia Americana (1924 ed., vol. 21, p. 460) states that Peate attended Oberlin about this time. The Doctorate was an honorary one conferred by Allegheny College.

Fradenburgh, op. cit. (footnote 2), p. 204.

Preston, p. 130, n. 10; p. 131, n. 19; p. 148.

“On the Construction of a Silvered Glass Telescope, Fifteen and a Half Inches in Aperture, and its Use in Celestial Photography,” Smithsonian Contributions to Knowledge, vol. 14, art. 3, iv+55 pp., 1865 (reprinted in vol. 34 as art. 2, 1904).

Preston, p. 148. From an article in the Greenville, Pa., Record Argus, December 17, 1903.

Preston, p. 148. In 1960 it was further learned that an “American Temperance” college or university once existed at Harriman.

Scientific American, October 24, 1891, vol. 65, p. 260.

Communication from Thiel College, Preston, p. 131, n. 17.

Popular Astronomy, July 1898, vol. 6, p. 310.

Preston, p. 129, notes 2 & 3. Based on recollections of George Lambert (1895) and John Morrison (1903). That the decision to make the mirror 62 inches in diameter may have had another origin is suggested by the fact that Common, in England, had made two mirrors of 60 and 61 inches in 1886-91.

Minutes of the Erie Conference, 1893, p. 29. Preston, p. 130, n. 4.

Preston has reconstructed the story of the making of the 62-inch mirror from contemporary journals, which will be cited below, and from personal communications with some of the participants, notably George Howard and George Lambert. Detailed citation of these communications are given in Preston. He has also used a brief manuscript account by Peate himself (Preston, p. 142, n. 62).

Communication with Frank A’Hearn and John Hodge. Preston, p. 135.

Peate’s workshop and apparatus is described in detail by Preston, pp. 135-138.

Preston, p. 139.

Advance Argus, Greenville, Pa., May 9, 1895. Preston, p. 139.

Clipping of uncertain date from the Pittsburgh Leader, quoting the National Glass Budget. Preston, p. 139 and n. 55.

Preston, p. 140.

Preston, p. 139.

Preston, p. 140.

Preston, p. 142.

The Brashear Instrument Company, after the death of its founder John Brashear, became the J. W. Fecker Company, Inc. This concern is now a division of the American Optical Company.

Preston, pp. 142-143.

The mirror is no longer silvered. The silver surface was apparently removed during the inspection by the Bureau of Standards in the 1920’s.

Preston, p. 144. Various notices were published in the American University Courier in 1898.

Preston, pp. 145-146.