1. Allen, Zachariah, The Practical Tourist, or Sketches of the State of the Useful Arts, and of Society, Scenery & & in Great-Britain, France and Holland. 2 vols. Providence, R.I.: A. S. Beckwith, 1832. Some illustrations. England, Wales, Scotland, Ireland, France, Netherlands.

Allen (1794-1882, DAB) was a Rhode Island textile manufacturer and inventor of mechanical devices. He took his trip abroad in 1825, though his account includes some information of later date. While Allen's interests obviously centered on textiles, he visited a wide variety of factories, engineering works, museums, and institutions, including hospitals and anatomical collections. He did not hesitate to make pronouncements about the quality of products or to compare European efforts to American, making his book particularly valuable for a consideration of early American industrialization. For example, on visiting a large English flour mill at Leeds he noted "I saw here none of the labor-saving contrivances for receiving the grain and elevating it by machinery to the grain lofts, without manual labor, in little leather buckets fixed on an endless revolving band; nor the perfect arrangements for removing hot flour as fast as it falls from the stones, and for stirring and cooling it previously to its being packed." (1:205). In France he paid more attention to agriculture than in Britain, but he visited and admired the mechanical models at the Conservatoire des Arts et Metiérs, and took the time to inform a woolen manufacturer at Louviers about American innovations. On a brief visit to the Netherlands he took an interest in canals, windmills, the National Manufactures exhibition at Haarlem, and Tyler's Museum. This work is a real compendium of European technology, having many brief but effective descriptions. Americans of the time thought well of it (see review in American Journal of Science 23 [1833]: 213-25), and historians of the period have found it a useful reference.

2. *Bache, Alexander Dallas, Report on Education in Europe to the Trustees of the Girard College for Orphans. Philadelphia: Lydia R. Bailey, 1839. England, Germany, Scotland, Netherlands, Austria, Switzerland, France, Belgium, Italy.

3. Baldwin, George Rumford, letter of 8 June 1834 to Loammi Baldwin, in Loammi Baldwin, Report on the Subject of Introducing Pure Water into the City of Boston. Boston: John H. Eastburn, 1834. Pp. 16-18. Scotland.

4. *Booth, James Curtis. Wyndam D. Miles, "With James Curtis Booth in Europe, 1834," Chymia 11(1966): 139-49. Austria.

This article includes substantial extracts from Booth's journal of his visit to Vienna during his German studies of the 1830s. Booth (1810-1888, DAB) showed particular interest in industrial works, including a hat works, paper mill, tannery, almond oil press, a textile printing factory, and a porcelain works. He also visited the Polytechnic Institute and several museums.

5. Colburn, Zerah, [Cost, Working, and Construction of English Railways], Journal of the Franklin Institute, 3rd ser., 35 (April 1858): 285-87.

Colburn (1832-70, Appleton's) was a publisher and mechanical engineer. He had visited England and France in 1855 and 1856, and during and after his trip published in the Railroad Advocate (of which he was editor) accounts of iron and machine works there. In 1857 "he again visited Europe at the request of several railroad presidents" Appleton's) and in 1858 published a work comparing American and European railroad practices, titled The Permanent Way, coauthored by his traveling companion, the engineer Alexander Lyman Holley. Colburn attended a meeting of the Franklin Institute on 18 March 1858 and presented a series of statistical and qualitative comparisons between American and European railroads, and a description of smokeless coal-burning locomotives used for passenger trains in England. Colburn was apparently traveling to major railroad centers selling subscriptions for his book.

6. Curwen, Samuel, Journal and Letters of the late Samuel Curwen, Judge of the Admiralty, etc., An American Refugee in England from 1775 to 1784. George Atkinson Ward, ed. New York: C. S. Francis and C., 1842. England.

Curwen (1715-1802, DAB) was a Massachusetts native and graduate of Harvard. He had been abroad in the late 1730s and became a merchant in Salem on his return. At the onset of the American Revolution he was exiled for his Tory sympathies, and spent the duration of the Revolutionary War living and traveling in England. Several times he visited British industrial works and briefly described them, although he found at Manchester that "it is with difficulty one is admitted to see their works, and in many cases it is impracticable, express prohibitions being given by their masters." (7 June 1777) He also attended some public scientific lectures and at least one meeting of the Royal Society (20 March 1783).

7. "Description of the Chain Bridge over the Straits of Menai, North Wales," Journal of the Franklin Institute 3 (1827): 138-39.

This note is reprinted from a New York newspaper and is introduced by this statement: "The following description of the stupendous chain bridge in North Wales, is furnished by a friend, who has lately received it in a letter from a gentleman now travelling in England." The publication of such accounts was common in the 1820s when internal improvements agitation reached a peak in the United States. Thomas Telford's chain bridge over the Menai Straits, completed in 1825, quickly became an attraction for technically-inclined tourists.

8. Fisk, Wilbur, Travels in Europe: viz., in England, Ireland, Scotland, France, Italy, Switzerland, Germany, and the Netherlands. 4th ed. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1838. Plates of a Swiss suspension bridge, and of the Thames Tunnel.

Fisk (1792-1839, DAB) was a New England Methodist minister who became the first president of Wesleyan University of Middletown, Connecticut in 1830. In 1835 he went abroad for several reasons: to restore his declining health, to strengthen relations between American and English Methodists, to study educational institutions, and to purchase scientific apparatus for Wesleyan. His book is written as a series of dated letters followed by undated chapters. It is disappointing for the historian of science and technology to find this work written more as a travelogue than as a description of how he fulfilled the purposes of his visit. His most substantial contributions are his consideration of French educational institutions and of a British Association for the Advancement of Science meeting in 1836. He made only a brief comment on English and French instrument-makers, and described his visits to several manufacturing establishments in England and France.

9. *Franklin, Benjamin, The Papers of Benjamin Pranklin. Leonard Labaree and William B. Willcox, eds. 23 volumes to date. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1959-

From 1757 to 1785 Franklin (1706-90, DAB) was almost constantly abroad, at first in England (to 1775), and then in France (from 1777). There is little in the Papers which can be called a traveler's account, though he loved to travel, making tours through Holland, Germany, and France, as well as part of England. Instead Franklin's Papers stand as a reference point for American knowledge of European science and technology. When he received a letter from Philadelphian Samuel Rhoads in 1771 asking about canal construction, for example, Franklin was able to provide documents and a clear statement from personal experience about the preferable technology. As an active member of the Royal Society in London he was a conduit for scientific information flowing to and from America. Thus, any researcher concerned about American knowledge of European science and technology during the Franklin era would be wise to consult his papers.

10. *Gibbs, [Oliver] Wolcott, "Great Exhibition in London," American Journal of Science, 2nd ser., 12(November 1851): 440-42.

Gibbs (1822-1908, DAB) had a medical education at New York, then studied in Germany and France, 1845-48. Thereafter he taught science at the Free Academy in New York, and, front 1863-87, at Harvard. On visiting the Crystal Palace Exhibition at London he wrote this report on scientific instruments displayed by the British, French, Dutch, German, and Swiss manufacturers. He noted that the United States Coast survey exhibited two balances by Joseph Saxton "at least equal in point of workmanship to any which the writer has seen abroad." One of those instruments may be that in Library Hall of the American Philosophical Society.

11. *Gibson, William, Rambles in Europe in 1839. Philadelphia: Lea and Blanchard, 1841.

Gibson (1788-1868, DAB) was an American surgeon who had studied at Edinburgh and London 1806-09, then taught at the University of Maryland and the University of Pennsylvania. He was recognized for his innovations in surgical technique such that by the time he went abroad again in 1839 he was (by his own account) greeted enthusiastically by surgeons in England, Scotland, Ireland, and France. As a result this book reads like a Who's Who of contemporary European surgeons and physicians, with frequent descriptions of individuals and their work, often accompanied by anecdotes. There are particularly detailed accounts of the French surgeon Velpeau, and the English surgeon Sir Charles Bell. Gibson described numerous hospitals, medical schools, and museums, and provided extensive descriptions of his attendance at meetings of the Provincial Medical and Surgical Association (July 1839), and the British Association for the Advancement of Science (August 1839). Altogether this book is a stunning record of the international medical community.

12. *Gilpin, Joshua, extracts of journals of 1795-1801 . Harold B. Hancock and Norman B. Wilkinson, "Joshua Gilpin: An American Manufacturer in England and Wales, 1795-1801--Part 1," Newcomen Society Transactions 32 (1959-60): 15-28; "Part 2," Newcomen Society Transactions 33 (1960-61): 57-66. England and Wales. Plate of Wilkinson's boring mill in vol. 32.

Gilpin (1765-1840, Appleton's) was a Philadelphia merchant with a deep interest in industrial technology. During this sojourn he kept detailed journals of his observations: the original journals are at the William Penn Archives (Harrisburg, Pa.), and microfilm copies are at the Science Museum and Friends Library in London. The extracts printed here run to about a page each and cover potteries, roads and canals, coal mining, iron-making, copper manufacture, shot manufacture, pin-making, the Birmingham mint, paper mills, salt mining, glass manufacture, shipyards, and textiles. Gilpin certainly put his newly-acquired knowledge to use. As a result of this and a later trip to England in 1811-1814, he brought chlorine bleaching and machine-made paper into his family business, and he became a tireless promoter of the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal. In 1804 the engineer Benjamin Henry Latrobe said that of all the members of the canal's board of managers, Gilpin was the only one with the requisite knowledge of canal technology.

13. *Griscom, John, A Year in Europe, Comprising a Journal of Obsevations in England, Scotland, Ireland, France, Switzerland, the North of Italy, and Holland, In 1818 and 1819. 2nd ed. 2 vols. New York: Abraham Paul, 1824.

Written as a series of 42 dated letters, this work is distinguished by the author's contacts with notable European chemists. Griscom (1774-1852, DAB) had taught chemistry at Columbia College (New York) prior to his travels in Europe and, according to BDAS, he was "known as a teacher and disseminator of scientific discoveries from Europe." His most significant contacts were made in Paris where he attended numerous lectures, and spent considerable time with Gay-Lussac, Berzelius, Thenard, Cuvier, and Brogniart. In England he attended several of Sir Joseph Banks's conversazione, and met or heard lectures by numerous scientists, but he seems to have been more interested in English industry than science. He visited Birmingham, Manchester, Plymouth Dockyard, Sheffield, Leeds, and New Lanark, the last of which he described at length. In Italy, the Netherlands, Scotland, and Ireland Griscom largely visited learned institutions and hospitals. Griscom is perhaps the first American travel writer who acted as (and who was accepted as) an equal to the European scientists. As such he was able to provide the earliest comprehensive account of European science which was not merely a traveler's description, but rather a sophisticated assessment of individuals and institutions.

14. *Harrison, Joseph, Jr., The Iron Worker and King Solomon. 2nd ed. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott Co., 1869. Russia and England.

Considerable sections of the idiosyncratic book relate to Harrison's years in Russia, 1843-52, where he built locomotives for the St. Petersburg-Moscow Railroad, and a bridge over the Neva River. He reminisced more on personalities in the Russian engineering bureaucracy than on the engineering works themselves. Harrison (1810-74, DAB) had been asked to go to Russia on the strength of his achievements in the Philadelphia firm of Eastwick & Harrison, and after his Russian experience he returned to pursue a successful career in that city. Overall this book's reminiscences are breezy and egotistical.

15. Hazard, Erskine, "Observations upon Rail-roads," Journal of the Franklin Institute 3 (1827): 275-77.

Erskine Hazard, a Philadelphia civil engineer, was in England and Wales in 1826 to observe railroads, and returned to build the Mauch Chunk Railroad for the Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company. In this note he related some of his observations of British rails, roadbed, and carriages. He noted that steam locomotives had fallen out of favor on the Hetton railroad (to be replaced with stationary engines), and that he was "decidely of opinion, that in this country a rail-way of wood, sheathed with iron, would be preferable to any other, and could be kept constantly in order at the least expense." Hazard's Mauch Chunk Railroad was examined by many early American railroad promoters and engineers as the best example of railroad technology in America.

16. *Henry, Joseph, The Papers Joseph Henry. Nathan Reingold, et al., eds. 4 vols. to date. Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1972- .Numerous sketches. England, Scotland, France, Belgium.

Henry (1797-1878, DAB) was a student and teacher at Albany (NY) Academy before he moved on to Princeton College in 1832 and ultimately (in 1846) to head the Smithsonian Institution. Volume 3 of the Papers is dominated by Henry's trip abroad, March-October 1837, mainly to purchase scientific instruments for Princeton. That purpose reinforced Henry's own predilection for designing and making scientific apparatus, and makes his letters and diary entries read like a manual of experimental and teaching instruments at times. But he also reported on the major scientific institutions of the day, including the Royal Society, Geological Society of London, British Museum, Institute of France, Royal Society of Edinburgh, Royal Institution of Edinburgh, and the British Association for the Advancement of Science meeting.

Henry recounted meetings with many British and French scientists, and a few Belgians. His publications obtained for him a positive reception by almost all with whom he had contact. Only a brief incident at the BAAS meeting in Liverpool pointed up a lingering superiority which some Europeans felt regarding American science. An impressive number of Americans are also noted in Henry's account, including several scientists and physicians, and many merchants. The editors also chose to include in this volume several entries from the diary of Alexander Dallas Bache, who accompanied Henry during much of his European visit.

17. Hilliard, George Stillman, Six Months In Italy. 2 vols. Boston: Tichnor, Reed, and Fields, 1853.

Hillard (1808-79, Appleton's), a Massachusetts lawyer, provided mostly standard tourist descriptions, but he did visit and describe the Arsenal at Venice, the University of Bologna, the Museum at Naples, and the Institution for the Insane at Rome. He was enthusiastic about the Museum of Natural History at Florence and was in particular awe of its wax anatomical models. He visited Italy in 1847-48.

18. Hughes, George Wurtz, "Notes on Belgium," Journal of the Franklin Institute 3rd ser., 2 (1841): 73-83, 154-64, 224-32, 298-304.

19. *Jefferson Thomas, The Papers of Thomas Jefferson. Julian P. Boyd and Charles T. Cullen, eds. 21 vols. to date. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1950- . Some sketches. England, France, Italy, Netherlands, Germany.

Volumes 8, 9, 11, and 13 contain some record of Jefferson's scientific and technical observations while the new republic's ambassador to France, 1785-89. His most substantial accounts were "Notes of a Tour into the Southern Parts of France. &c" (1787) in which he commented on agriculture and the Canal du Languedoc, and his "Notes of a Tour through Holland and the Rhine Valley" (1788) with observations on agriculture, viniculture, windows, canal machinery and other topics. Jefferson's agricultural interests are comparatively unusual among traveler's accounts, and perhaps thereby more important. It is notable, for example, that on his return from two months in England (a trip of which little record survives) he commented that "the mechanical arts in London are carried to a wonderful perfection," but what impressed him the most was a steam-powered grist mill (Jefferson to Page, 4 May 1786)--the industrialization of food processing. And while traveling through southern France he wrote that

"In the great cities, I go to see what travellers think alone worthy of being seen; but I make a job of it, and generally gulp it down in a day. On the other hand, I am never satiated with rambling through the fields and farms, examining the culture and cultivators, with a degree of curiosity which makes some take me to be a fool, and others to be much wiser than I am."(Jefferson to Lafayette, 11 April 1787)

20. *Keating, William H., Considerations Upon the Art of Mining. To which are added, Reflections on its actual state in Europe, and the Advantages which would result from an Introduction of this art into the United States. Read before the American Philosophical Society, July 20th, 1821. Philadelphia: M. Carey and Sons, 1821. France, Switzerland, Savoy, Germany, Netherlands, Scotland, England.

Keating (1799-1840, DAB), was a Philadelphian who studied in Paris at the École des Mines, arriving in 1817. Upon his return he became an investor in enterprises developing the anthracite coal regions of Pennsylvania. In this substantial paper (87 pp.) Keating reviewed the state of mining technology in Europe and found it substantially in advance of American practice--in fact, he disdained even to call American ore extraction "mining," writing that "we may be warranted in saying that there are as yet no mines in activity in the United States." He concluded by arguing for the introduction of mining because of the economic benefit it would bring, and particularly urged the importation of German miners and steam engines.

Keating provided extensive descriptions of the mines of France, Germany, and Britain, and of the École des Mines.

21. Knight, Jonathan, William G. McNeill, and George W. Whistler, [Letters on British railroads], Niles' Weekly Register 34 (1829): 92-93, 273-74.

The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad commissioned these engineers to go to Britain to examine railroad practice before commencing construction of the B&O. The engineers never did publish a full report of their observations as they expected to, but three of their letters to the company were published. They discussed the Stockton and Darlington, and Killingworth railroads, and assessed the capabilities of current railroad technology, concluding that "experience daily develops the great advantages resulting from the introduction of rail roads."

22. *La Roche, René, "Medical Education and Institutions: An Account of the Origin, Progress, and Present State of the Medical School of Paris," American Journal of Medical Sciences, offprints for May 1831, pp. 1-16; August 1831, pp. 1-18; February 1832, pp. 35-72.

23. *Livingston, Robert, Essay on Sheep: Their Varieties--Account of the Merinoes of Spain, France, &c. Concord, N.H.: Daniel Cooledge, 1813.

While Minister to France during the Jefferson administration, Livingston (1746-1812, DAB) acquired "such information in agriculture and the arts as would be useful to my fellow citizens." An especial interest of his was merino sheep, which he had sent to the United States in 1802. This book records his observations of European sheep-raising and -breeding practice, but it concentrates on good sheep husbandry in America.

24. *Merrick, Samuel V., Report upon an Examination of Some of the Gas Manufactories in Great Britain, France and Belgium ... Philadelphia: Philadelphia City Councils, 1834. Scotland, England, France, Belgium.

25. *Morgan, John, The Journal of Dr. John Morgan of Philadelphia, from the City of Rome to the City of London, 1764. Julia Morgan Harding, ed. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott Company, 1907. Italy, Switzerland.

During his English medical studies Morgan (1735-89, DAB) took a gentleman's tour of Italy, but gave considerable attention to scientific and technical sites. He met several Italian professors, including Dr. Laura Maria Catherina Bassi (Bologna), Dr. Serrati (Bologna), Dr. Morgagni (Padua), and Dr. Flaminio Torrigiani (Parma), and visited various anatomical collections and museums. At Venice he paid attention to glassmaking and the Arsenal's shops. Later he observed the waterworks of Geneva and spent considerable time with Voltaire.

26. *Morris, Robert Hunter, "An American in London, 1735-36: The Diary of Robert Hunter Morris," Beverly McAnear, ed., Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 64 (April 1940): 164-217, (July 1940): 356-406.

Morris (1713-64) was in England assisting his father, Lewis Morris, Sr., who was agent for a group of New York landholders. The two men had a variety of interests, including science and technology, which led them to visit the Chelsea Waterworks, a glasshouse, and the Royal dockyards at Chatham. They also had a scientific discussion with Lord Elmore and observed an attempt to induce rabies. Perhaps the most interesting detail in this diary is that the two Morrises were called upon to give their opinions about altering the waterwheels of the Faversham and Guilford gunpowder mills. Apparently Americans were already recognized for their innovative waterpower technology in the early eighteenth century.

27. Mott, Valentine, Travels in Europe and the East. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1842. Britain, Ireland, France, Belgium, Netherlands, Prussia, Saxony, Bohemia, Austria, Bavaria, Switzerland, Italy, Malta, Greece, Egypt, Turkey, Moldavia, Wallachia, Hungary.

The author (1785-1865, DAB) was a surgeon who was educated at Columbia College, then studied in England and Scotland in 1807. He traveled abroad again in 1834-41, renewing his acquaintances in Britain and making new ones elsewhere in the medical community of northern Europe. He sometimes combined accounts of his current travels with reminiscences of his school days. The book often makes assessments of the successes and failures of European surgery. He was enthusiastic about French accomplishments in orthopedics and the institution of charting in a Vienna hospital. He saw several medical and anatomical museums. Near Eastern and Balkan medicine were beneath his notice.

28. [Paine, Robert Treat], "Information to Students Visiting Europe," American Journal of Science, 2nd ser., 22 (November 1856): 146-48. England, France, Germany.

29. *Pancoast, Joseph, Professional Glimpses Abroad: A Lecture, Introductory to a Course on Anatomy, in the Jefferson Medical College of Philadelphia, Delivered October 17, 1856. Philadelphia: Joseph M. Wilson, 1856. England, France, Germany, Austria, Italy.

Pancoast (1805-82, DAB) was an anatomist and surgeon who taught at Jefferson Medical College. Having just returned from some months in Europe, where he observed surgical practice and visited medical institutions, Pancoast discussed his experience. He commented particularly on plastic surgery, bone and joint surgery, and ophthalmic surgery. He described at some length the use of chloroform and sulfuric ether (ethyl ether) as anesthetics; he was undecided as to which was better and what was the proper mode of administration. Pancoast's lecture is a clear example of how the latest news from Europe was disseminated.

30. *Peale, [Benjamin] Franklin, "Description of the new Coining Presses lately introduced into the U.S. Mint, Philadelphia," Journal of the Franklin Institute, new ser. 18 (November 1836): 307-10. France, Germany, England.

31. *Peale, [Benjamin] Franklin, "On the Manufacture of India Rubber Web," Journal of the Franklin Institute, new ser. 19 (February 1837): 109-12. France.

32. Peale, Rembrandt, Notes on Italy. Philadelphia: Carey & Hart, 1831. France, Italy, Switzerland, England.

This volume was published in journal form, recording some of Peale's thoughts and observations while abroad, 1828-30. Although he was an artist, Peale (1778-1860, DAB) demonstrated his family's catholic interests by visiting a variety of museums and industrial works. He was particularly impressed by the Jardin des Plantes at Paris, which he noted had enriched its collections noticeably since his visit of 20 years earlier, though he still thought its insects and animal specimens were inferior to those in the Philadelphia Museum of his brother Titian Peale.

33. *Robinson, Moncure, "Letters of Moncure Robinson to his father, John Robinson, of Richmond, Va., Clerk of Henrico Court," William and Mary Quarterly, 2nd ser., 8 (April 1928): 71-95; 8 (July 1928): 141-56. France, Britain, Netherlands.

Robinson (1802-91,DAB) went to Europe in 1825 to study civil engineering and remained for two years, attending lectures in Paris and traveling in France, the Netherlands, England, Wales, and perhaps Scotland. Fifteen of his letters (mostly from France) were published without editing. I compared them with the originals in the Moncure Robinson Papers at the College of William and Mary and found them accurately transcribed.

The letters not only provide details about Robinson's education and travels, but frequently record his opinions about European technology. After a few weeks in France he went to London and did not hesitate to judge the French "at least one hundred years behind the English" in "practical mechanics."

34. *Rush, Benjamin, Letters of Benjamin Rush. Lyman H. Butterfield, ed. Memoirs of the American Philosophical Society, vol. 30, pt. 1. 2 vols. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press for the American Philosophical Society, 1951. Scotland and England.

About twenty letters in this collection date from Rush's medical studies in Britain, 1766-69. Rush (1745-1813, DAB) became deeply involved in the professional activities of both the students and physicians in Edinburgh and London. He became Joseph Black's lecture assistant and claimed that Black "has honored me with his particular friendship." Although he found his Edinburgh studies to be of the highest quality, on going to London he found that he learned much by going to lectures and attending hospitals there.

As a professor at the University of Pennsylvania Rush taught a large number of the most prominent physicians and future professors of medicine in the early United States.

35. Schinz, Charles, "Extracts from the diary of Charles Schinz, Consulting Chemist of Camden, New Jersey, during a Journey in Europe," Journal of the Franklin Institute, 3rd ser., 32 (1856): 56-63, 129-37. Switzerland, Bavaria, Austria, England.

Schinz is unidentified except by the information in this article, which states that he was born in Switzerland and emigrated to the United States within the twelve years previous to publication. While in Switzerland he had been a consultant to a textile bleaching works. On this tour of 1855-56 he observed morocco tanning, concrete vaulting, chlorine bleaching of textiles, woodpulp paper making, turf compressing for fuel, the making of illuminating gas from wood, and glass manufacture.

A considerable portion of this article is given over to Schinz's description of the Polytechnic School of Switzerland. After listing the courses (which he notes follow the German plan) he states that "we may safely assert that this is not the best plan for the education of practical men!" On the basis of his experience in industrial chemistry he argued that the students were taught too much theory and not enough practice.

36. Sellers, George Escol, Early Engineering Reminiscences (1815-1840) of George Escol Sellers. Eugene S. Ferguson, ed. United States National Museum Bulletin no. 238. Washington: Smithsonian Institution, 1965. England. (Chapters 13-17).

Sellers (1808-99) was a mechanical engineer who was trained in his father's shop in Philadelphia. Like so many other American engineers of his time Sellers went abroad (in 1832) to study English technology, generally the most advanced in the world. A particular object of his attention was papermaking machinery and he contrived to visit the works of Bryan Donkin, the builder of the sophisticated Fourdrinier continuous-flow papermakers.

37. *Silliman, Benjamin, A Journal of Travels in England, Holland and Scotland, and of Two Passages over the Atlantic, in the years 1805 and 1806. 2 vols. New York: Ezra Sargeant, 1810. England, Scotland, and the Netherlands.

Benjamin Silliman (1779-1864,DAB) is the archetype of American reporters on European science and technology. Trained at Yale, he was asked to prepare to teach science there by studying further at the University of Pennsylvania. Then in 1804 he was commissioned by the Yale trustees to go to Europe to purchase books and scientific apparatus for the college, and to increase his own learning.

Silliman's journals of his travels was at least in part kept for his brother, Gold S. Silliman of Newport, Rhode Island, who was interested in textile manufacturing. But Silliman's descriptions range widely over sights, institutions, and individuals. He was an indefatigable visitor of museums, gardens (he bought a pass to the Chelsea Gardens in London), live-animal exhibits (he reported being spit upon by a Ilama) and private scientific cabinets. He saw numerous industrial and engineering sites, including cotton mills at Manchester (though he confessed to his brother that he could not possibly describe all of the processes), Liverpool and London docks, and the mines of Cornwall. He briefly visited the Netherlands and visited museums and collections there, but was denied permission to enter France.

Silliman found English scientists and manufacturers receptive to his inquiries and sympathetic to his purposes. Attending one of St. Joseph Banks's conversaziones he met numerous prominent scientists and subsequently met others at the Royal Institution, Cambridge University and Edinburgh University. If he did not move among them as a complete equal, there is no evidence that they lacked respect for his ability.

Silliman's journal of 1805-06 is the earliest major American travel account which I have found that focuses primarily on science and technology. It marks a divide between the dominance of accounts by the scientifically- and technically- informed who came from relative backwaters, and the beginning of travel by those who are purposefully reporting to a growing body of scientific and technical professionals in America. Silliman was himself conscious of America's changing role, and observed while at Cambridge University that "in classical learning and philological literature we are certainly far behind the English institutions, but in mathematics, ethics, and the physical sciences, some of our institutions are probably equal to them." (2: 233-34)

38. *Silliman, Benjamin, A Visit to Europe in 1851. 2 vols. New York: G. P. Putnam & Company, 1854. England, Wales, France, Sardinia, Tuscany, Rome and the Papal States, Naples and Neapolitan states, Lombardy, Venice, Switzerland, Germany, Prussia, Belgium.

Benjamin Silliman's second trip abroad followed his first by 45 years, a gap which witnessed a transformation of American science and technology. Silliman had played an important role in that transformation by founding the American Journal of Science in 1818. Since his journal became a conduit for the transatlantic flow of scientific ideas, Silliman was well known to Europeans by the time of his return visit. He moved easily among the famous scientists of the era, including Charles Lyell, Adolphe Brongniart, Francois-Jules Pictet, Justus Liebig, and Alexander von Humboldt. After a few days in Paris Silliman could report that "among the men of science in that city we met with only a solitary instance of cool manners."

During the six months he was abroad (as on his earlier trip) Silliman frequently visited botanical and zoological gardens, and private collections of specimens. Though he examined some chemical and physical apparatus, in line with his own interests he focused on mineralogy, geology, paleontology, and botany. He was perhaps most impressed by the "immense and unrivalled treasures" of the Jardin des Plantes at Paris, where he reveled in the 200,000 specimens of extinct and extant animals. But even in the modest Sicilian city of Catania, Silliman appreciated the mineralogical and geological collections of its museum of natural history.

For all his scientific orientation, the ostensible purpose for Silliman's visit was to see the Crystal Palace Exhibition in London, with its largely technological exhibits. On his first visit late in March 1851 he was greatly impressed by the building itself, but noted that many of the exhibits had yet to arrive. Returning late in the summer he reported that he had "walked many hours, and I presume ten miles in this immense structure, [yet] I seem only to have begun to see it." He assessed the American exhibit as "not so splendid" as the other exhibits, but noted that the plow and reaper were particularly valued and appreciated for their utility.

Throughout his travels Silliman showed a keen interest in civil engineering. Between debarking at Liverpool and arriving at London a few days later he saw the Liverpool and Manchester Railroad, the Liverpool docks, the Menai Suspension Bridge, the Britannia (tubular) Bridge, the railway viaduct and canal aqueduct at Chirk, and the Great Western Railroad. Later, on the continent, he was impressed by French highways and bridges, but he noted that "almost all Europe is superior to us in the United States" in that field.

Overall, this journal is more hectic and summary than that of his earlier travels, but still provides a superb record of how an informed American assessed the most important persons, institutions, and material culture of European science and technology.

39. *Silliman, Benjamin, Jr., "Miscellaneous Notes, from Europe," American Journal of Science, 2nd ser., 12 (September 1851): 256-61. Italy and France.

40. *[Smith, George Washington], Internal Improvement. Rail Roads, Canals, Bridges, &c. Philadelphia: n.p., 1825.

41. Stewart, F. Campbell, The Hospitals and Surgeons of Paris. New York: J. & H. G. Langley; Philadelphia: Carey & Hart, 1843.

This book was written especially for American medical students intending to study surgery in France, and was based upon the author's experience of several years residence there. Stewart argued that "in no other part of the world can general or professional studies [in surgery] be pursued to greater advantage, or at so little cost to the student, as in France." Among the numerous advantages noted by Stewart were that anatomy could be more easily studied because of the abundance of corpses supplied by Parisian hospitals, and that orthopedics was practiced and taught as a separate branch of medicine. Much of the book provides descriptions of French medical institutions, and nearly half is devoted to biographical sketches of Paris surgeons.

42. *Strickland, William, "A Description of the Hetton Rail Road, in England; by Wm. Strickland, Esq. Civil Engineer. (With an Engraving)," Journal of the Franklin Institute 1 (1826): 15-16, plate. England.

43. *Strickland, William, Reports on Canals, Railways, Roads and Other Subjects, Made to "The Pennsylvania Society for the Promotion of Internal Improvement." Philadelphia: H. C. Carey & I. Lea, 1826. Oversized plates. England, Wales.

This oversized volume with 51 pages of text and 71 plates is one of the great engineering documents of the industrial age. William Strickland (c. 1787-1854, DAB) was a trained and experienced engineer when he was commissioned early in 1825 by the Pennsylvania Society for Internal Improvement to travel to Britain to report on canals, railways, turnpikes, breakwaters, calico printing, gas lighting, machinery, and iron manufacture (topics of particular interest to Philadelphia merchants). During his six-month visit he was aided by "distinguished civil engineers" who "freely communicated to him the designs of their most important public works; [and] their plans of improvement, contemplated or commenced, were exhibited to him." In a series of subsequent reports, illustrated with excellent drawings by Samuel Kneass, who was his secretary and traveling companion, Strickland wrote concisely yet informatively about each mandated subject. Published in a limited number of copies by subscription, Strickland's Reports quickly attained the status of a classic on both sides of the Atlantic. It was particularly influential in its depiction of railroads as effective technological systems.

44. Tallmadge, James, letters in Journal of the American Institute 1 (1835-36): 54-56, 157-59, 210-13, 177-79, 327-31, 385-88, 434-41, 486-88, 613-14; 2 (1836-37): 46-47, 107-11, 269-72. England, Wales, Scotland, Ireland, France, Italy, Russia, Netherlands, and Switzerland.

James Tallmadge (1778-1853, DAB) was president of the American Institute of New York, a society for the promotion of science and technology. While traveling abroad in 1835-36 Tallmadge wrote a series of letters (17 of which were published) regarding his observations. His letters typically described specific practices or innovations which he thought Americans should adopt, and also mentioned his visits to various institutions of learning. Although Tallmadge reported on a wide range of science and technology, he was most interested in textile manufactures, especially silk; agriculture and sheep-raising; civil engineering and architecture; and medicine.

45. *Warden, David Bailie, Microfilm Edition of the David Bailie Warden Papers. Bayly Ellen Marks, ed. Baltimore, Md.: Maryland Historical Society, 1970.

David Bailie Warden (1772-1845, DAB), was an Irish expatriate who lived in New York and was confirmed an American citizen in 1804. He became a member of the staff of the American legation in Paris in the same year. He lost his position in 1814, but chose to remain in Paris and for the next 30 years served as a cultural intermediary for American visitors.

Warden cultivated French intellectuals by sharing with them his collection of American materials and by publishing several works on the United States. As a result he was elected to the Institut de France and various learned societies in Paris, in addition to becoming acquainted with a range of major figures in French science, engineering, government, and literature.

46. Watson, Elkanah, Men and Times of the Revolution. Winslow C. Watson, ed. 2nd ed. New York: Dana and Company, 1857. Reprint ed. by Crown Point Press, 1968. England, France, Belgium, Netherlands, and Germany.

Watson (1758-1842, DAB) spent 1779-84 abroad. He kept a journal of his travels which was considerably edited by a descendant before it was published. The printed version contains an account of a meeting with Franklin in 1779 during which Franklin turned Watson's attention to canals. Subsequently Watson traveled on canals in France (Canal du Midi), Belgium, the Netherlands, and England (the Duke of Bridgewater's Canal). His experiences are especially significant because of Watson's later role as a promoter of the Erie Canal.

47. Watson, Elkanah, A Tour in Holland in MDCCLXXXIV by an American. Worcester, Mass.: Isaiah Thomas, 1790.