Microscope Museum

Collection of antique microscopes and other scientific instruments

 

    

Microscope 109 (W. Watson & Sons; c. 1910)

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W. Watson & Sons were opticians and camera makers trading from London and Edinburgh. The company was originally founded in 1837 by William Watson at 71 City Road, and the business continued at this address until 1861, when it moved to 313 High Holborn. In 1867, the name was changed to W. Watson & Son. In 1882, the name was changed to W. Watson & Sons. In 1900 the company acquired the John Browning and Co., and in 1908 the firm became W. Watson & Sons Ltd. In 1929 they published an advert in the British Industries Fair Catalogue as an Optical, Scientific and Photographic Exhibit, highlighting the manufacture of microscopes for medical, industrial and educational purposes. Into the 1950s, the company changed their address to 25 West End Lane, Barnet, Hertfordshire, where they stayed until the late 1960s. In 1957 the company was acquired by Pye of Cambridge and ten years later, taken over by Philips. By 1970 the manufacture of microscopes was over. Microscope 109 is a Watson’s microscope. The instrument is labelled ‘Watson & Sons Ltd, London’ and has the serial number 11974, allowing to date it to c. 1910. The body of the microscope is identical to the Praxis microscope model as engraved in the company’s catalogue of 1912 (Figure 1). However, the instrument has a different type of foot. The objectives and eyepieces are engraved with ‘BOT. LAB. OXF.’, suggesting that this microscope originally belonged to the Department of Botany of University of Oxford. The original wooden box of the microscope contains a panel engraved with the name ‘Deborah R. Clowes’. This suggests that this instrument was related or belonged to Lionel Clowes (1921 – 2016), an emeritus reader from University of Oxford who discovered the quiescent centre of the roots in the early 1950s. The name on the wooden box correspond to Lionel’s daughter Deborah Rosemary Clowes.

 

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Figure 1. Watson’s Praxis stand microscope as engraved in the 1912 edition of the Watson catalogue.