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Lunar Society

  • Thread starter Thread starter hmld
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hmld

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I JUST CHANCED ACROSS A SPLENDID SITE WHILE DELVING ANOTHER CONTEXT.  I REFER TO THE LUNAR SOCIETY.  SOMEONE DID A MAGNIFICENT RESEARCH JOB.  SORT OF BREATHTAKING.  SUPPOSE MANY KNOW OF IT, THOUGH IF YOU ARE UNAWARE IT IS QUITE A TOE TAPPING SNAPPER UPPER. ;)
 
Hi ROD & hmld & other Forum,mers  O0

The Lunar Society (Formerly Lunar Circle) 1765 to 1813 used to meet at Mathew Boultons house,
Soho Road, Handsworth,, the Society still has an open exhibition/Museum etc there.

The Lunar title due to their nearest to Full Moon, Monday per month of meetings arranged.

THE most Famous Men of the time met at this Society, these Polymaths included
Mathew Boulton, James Watt, Charles Darwin  & many other most worthies of that genre
Known as the "Enlightenment Midlands" period therefore The Engineering etc Birth of Birmingham.   8) John Y
 
8)


KINDLY BRACE THYSELF.  I'M NOT A CYBERNETICAL WHIZZ KID THOUGH I AM CONFIDENT ROD & Co., can back engineer this.
It is a marvellously done job and a grand lot of snapshots  -  some a wheeze of nausea (subject content).
It is a scholarly piece which is just about definitive.

However it aught be borne in mind, foresooth, that the illumination of a full moon on a clear[/i ]night, while germane to peregrinating to one's abode after a hefty nosh and libation, is in a certain sense missing the point.  Basic common sense simple logic.
The full moon would often be obscured by cloud.  Also obscured by industrial effluent: coal, coke, wood burning.  If you recall first hand or if not enquire of those who did, the conditions prior to the introduction of the Smokeless Zone legislation then you will get a snapper upper as to how extreme  -  nay, grotesque  -  conditions routinely were.

Watt had a tunnel built from his house.  It was either by gas, as he was a scientist and mechanical engineer and quite wealthy.  The reason for the tunnel (does anyone know if it has been located?) was safety.  Not so much because one could barely see where one was heading late night but because the place was crawling with miscreant elements.  This begs the question as to why they didn't either summon a carriage or slumber in the capacious abodes  -  since they were at it most of the night.

A full moon is polarized light; as is mirror refraction.  It has nothing to do with lunacy in the sense of aberration, dementia.  Polarized light has science application and salubrious in the sense of efficacy for mentation.  The moon is illumined by the sun.  I dunno about mysticalities but there is a higher plane of consciousness obtaining.

How such intense, compacted exflorescence of genius obtains is of course inexplicable.  It is a nonsense query based on a mistaken assumption.  Same with the reign of Elizabeth I.  The Nazi dictatorship resulted in so much development it is as though a cosmic sleuse gate was opened and a Niagara falls unleashed.  So there's the gift of wisdom or folly. 

This is a hefty junior whopper of a site.  It is a good idea to get it into schools for inspiration.

Do you know if Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery still has in print the handsome (inexpensive) paperback on The Birmingham Lunar Society (monochrome, glossy)?  If not then I suggest you prevail on 'em to reprint.  They can expand and engage the Birmingham Scool of Art and Design.  I mean, what else are they doing other than slews of fine art projects?  It is hardly advocating venality.  A lot of new stuff can be incorporated.

The Jewellery Quarter crowd can chip in with a bumper donation.  As Bro Prf Dr Carl Chinn is enduring a five year secondment to S B Coll., - hairing about with his microphone conducting an exercise that should have started in the 1960s  -  perhaps he can chip in ample resources?

At any rate this is a spiffing start at that sterling site.

Highest regards  -  and may the best of good fortune attend your endeavours.
[Pls. let us know if you locate the site and what you make of it:  any scope for development?]

Also: so many photographs are done digital  -  and there is a difference to celluloid  -  but the crux of the matter is when they are taken.
Who in her/his right mind wants to view an image of building with motor traffic and people passing (or parked)?
Ditto rain slicked, overcast? 
When I/we used photograph we often did time exposures overnight; early morning  -  or whenever atmospheric conditions were conducive.
Consequently so many snapshots are an optimal shortfall.
Which is not only tiring, it is boring.
When you set infinity it has a flattening effect, unless you have film and stop way down to at least f22  -  better f64.  You'll need rigid support unless you are a yogi contortionist.
The reward is just plain brill-marv..
;)

https://jquarter.members.beeb.net/morelunar.htm

https://jquarter.members.beeb.net



MORE ABOUT ...

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Explore the Birmingham Jewellery Quarter 
 
THE LUNAR SOCIETY



Matthew Boulton



James Watt



Erasmus Darwin



Matthew Boulton's home, Soho House, where the Lunar Society often met. It is now open to the public



Joseph Priestley



Josiah Wedgwood



Richard Lovell Edgeworth



William Small



William Murdock



Benjamin Franklin



Thomas Jefferson, one-time pupil of William Small

The Lunar Society was a remarkable grouping of gifted polymaths who met every month in and around Birmingham on the Monday nearest the full moon (when there was most light to travel home by) from 1765 until 1813. To begin with, they called themselves the Lunar Circle, the more formal title 'Lunar Society' being adopted in 1775.

It has been written that 'The Lunar Society was second only to the Royal Society in its importance as a gathering place for scientists, inventors and natural philosophers during the second half of the eighteenth century'. In fact, it was more than that. These men were interested not merely in science, but especially in the application of science to manufacturing, mining, transportation, education, medicine and much else. They were, if you like, the revolutionary committee of that most far reaching of all the eighteenth century revolutions, the Industrial Revolution. Supremely confident, they were changing the world forever, and they knew it. They firmly believed that what they were doing would better the lot of mankind. They believed, as Jacob Bronowski put it, that 'the good life is more than material decency, but the good life must be based on material decency'. They believed that by raising productive capacity they would be able to deliver material decency for all,  and to a large extent, as far as the developed world is concerned, they have been proven right. Historians today talk of the 'Midlands Enlightenment', which was contemporaneous with the Parisian and Edinburgh enlightenments, but distinguished by its emphasis on going beyond thought, putting theory into practice and translating ideas into action. The Lunar Society was the heart of that Midlands Enlightenment.

Although the Lunar Society was not a political body - indeed, they never discussed politics or religion at their meetings - many of its members were politically liberal, in a rather 'New Labour' kind of way. Many of them sympathised with the ends, if not all of the means, of the French revolution and the American rebellion. They were humane, and sincere in wishing to improve the lot of ordinary people. They abhorred slavery and several of them led the campaign against it. But they believed in private property, in capitalist self help and entrepreneurialism, whilst advocating the extension of the franchise, measures to reduce corruption, and a reduction in the power of the church and aristocracy. They also enjoyed themselves; it is clear from their correspondence that their meetings were fun, as well as being intellectually stimulating, and they cheerfully referred to themselves as 'lunaticks'.

So who were they, this remarkable bunch of men? They numbered fourteen, as follows.

Matthew Boulton, who having built up the most famous manufacturing business of the day, went on to make a practical reality of James Watt's condensing steam engine, and then to invent modern, high quality, fraud resistant coinage.

Erasmus Darwin. Grandfather of Charles, a family doctor whose work in botany and evolution anticipated much of what his grandson would write fifty years later. He was also an acclaimed poet and an inventor, and like Joseph Priestley, was seen abroad, at least, as a top-flight philosopher.

Thomas Day, educational reformer and anti-slavery campaigner. Day's best-selling poem, The dying negro, written in 1773, explored the sufferings of the slaves and sparked off the anti-slavery campaign in Britain.

Richard Lovell Edgeworth. Also interested in educational reform,  he was a pioneer of telegraphy who furthermore made discoveries in the field of electricity and invented improved agricultural machinery and a steam carriage

Samuel Galton, a Quaker gunmaker with interests in science, who was disowned by the Society of Friends 'for fabricating and selling the instruments of war'.

Robert Augustus Johnson, chemist.

James Keir, who made advances in the manufacture of glass, and was a pioneer of the chemical industry. He became a partner in the company James Watt set up to exploit the copy-press he had invented, and helped Watt with experiments to produce the best ink for the process. But he made his fortune from a process he invented for manufacturing caustic soda. This was done by treating salt with sulphuric acid and then filtering the sodium sulphate that was produced through slaked lime. (Hydrochloric acid was also produced as a useful by-product.) He set up a factory at Bloomsmithy in Tipton to make caustic soda, but later converted the works into a soap manufactory (caustic soda being an important ingredient of soap). This large works, covering 20 acres, which was regarded as a model factory in its time, not only made Keir rich, it also transformed the nation's hygiene by making available, for the first time ever, a plentiful supply of cheap soap.

Joseph Priestley, a minister of religion and amateur scientist who discovered oxygen, the indiarubber eraser and much else, and invented carbonated water.

William Murdock, inventor of gas lighting.

William Small, doctor of medicine who had taught mathematics to the young Thomas Jefferson and who had interests in engineering, chemistry and metallurgy.

Jonathan Stokes, botanist.

James Watt, inventor of the condensing and rotary steam engines, an early copying process and much else; maker of musical and scientific instruments, canal surveyor and more.

Josiah Wedgwood, celebrated potter, canal promoter and Charles Darwin's other grandfather. 

John Whitehurst, maker of clocks and scientific instruments, and a pioneering geologist who did much to work out how the earth had been formed.

William Withering, another medical doctor, also a botanist with interests in metallurgy and chemistry. He is most famous for the discovery of the medicinal properties of the foxglove in treating heart disease, and took the place of William Small following the latter's untimely death in 1775.

The American statesman Benjamin Franklin was a corresponding member of the society, as were others including John Smeaton, the great civil engineer.

They held their meetings in one another's houses, often meeting at Matthew Boulton's home, Soho House, which is not far from the Jewellery Quarter and is open to the public. You can visit there the very room in which the Lunar Society met. They demonstrated scientific discoveries, discussed how those discoveries could be translated into new products or  industries, described practical problems they had encountered in their everyday activities and devised plans of action for solving them. They were much concerned, for example, with devising accurate means of measurement: accurate weights and measures were vital in assaying, whilst accurate measurements of furnace temperatures were of key importance to various manufacturing members of the group. The improvement of transport, particularly by the building of canals, concerned them and many of them invested in canal companies. But  Priestley, for example, in his experiments did science for science's sake, and they were interested in that, too.  And science was only the half of it. They discussed social, political and economic matters, and conducted wide-ranging debate about the social impact of the Industrial Revolution and the general revolutionary climate of the times. In a letter of apology written to Matthew Boulton, Erasmus Darwin gives a vivid flavour of their discussions:

'I am sorry the infernal Divinities, who visit mankind with diseases & are therefore at perpetual war with doctors, should have prevented my seeing all you great men at Soho today - Lord! What inventions, what wit, what rhetoric, metaphysical, mechanical & pyrotechnical will be on the wing, bandy'd like a shuttlecock from one to another of your troop of philosophers! While poor I, I by myself I, imprison'd in a post chaise, am joggled & jostled & bump'd & bruised along the King's high road, to make war on a pox or a fever!'

Why did all these distinguished people gather in Birmingham? Well, although chance played its part, you have to remember that Brum was leading the world in those days. The Soho Manufactory and the Soho Foundry were, if you like, the Silicon Valley of those times, and they drew people from all over the world, most to look, but some to live, just as Silicon Valley does today.

The Lunar Society was formally wound up in 1813, by which time only James Keir, James Watt, Edgeworth and Samuel Galton were still alive. They held a lottery to decide who should have their books, which Samuel Galton won. The youngest of the group, he survived until 1832. The rest were all gone by 1820.

 

More about James Watt

More about Matthew Boulton

More about Erasmus Darwin

More about Joseph Priestley

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Cheers Derek, Ill need a moment to reread your posting...... have back engineered and it seems to work just fine.
 
A MARVELLOUS SITE. THX

(AS WELL AS APERATURE ON FILM CAMERAS THERE IS ALSO THE CHOICE OF FILM! SPEED WISE AND WITH COLOUR QUITE A RANGE. EG: ILFACHROME AND EKTACHROME. ALAS ILFORD HAS TERMINATED PRODUCTION OF MONOCHROME, INCLUDING ARCHIVAL STOCK. POSSIBLY THE FINEST BLACK AND WHITE. THIS IS BECAUSE OF LAZINESS, LETHARGY, ETHOS OF INSTANT GRATIFICATION TITILATION FRENETECISMS. HOW MISERABLY WEARY.)
 
THAT SHOULD BE FRENETIC-isms - nervous static energy.
A SPLENDID SITE AS AN INDEX GERMANE TO WHAT IS POSSIBLE.
 
IT JUST OCCURED TO MYSELF THAT WHILE THE MOST OBVIOUS IS TO LIST THE LUNAR SOCIETY PARTICIPANTS, PROLIFIC VISIONARY GENIUS NATURAL PHILOSOPHERS, SCIENTISTS, A QUESTION OUTSTANDS AS A SORE THUMB; VIZ.:
HOW WERE THEY CAPITALIZED FOR SUCH ENORMOUS VENTURES?
THIS ANALYSIS WOULD PROVE A GREAT REVEAL.
(IN ANOTHER CONTEXT I ALSO WONDER HOW THE JJEWISH USURERS GOT THE MONEY IN THE FIRST PLACE TO MAKE LOANS CHARGING INTEREST AND SO GOT THE BOOT UNDER EDWARD I, WHO TOOK ON THE LIABILITY OF INTEREST PAYMENT HIMSELF WHEN MONEY LENDERS FORECLOSED ON SO MANY.
THIS ECONOMIC CALAMITY RESULTED IN THEIR BEING EXPELLED (NOT RETURNING UNTIL OLIVER CROMWELL) AND AN ESTIMATED 30k DECAMPED TO IRELAND WHERE THEY ENGAGED IN THE SAME PRACTICE. NATURALLY WHEN THE MONARCH GOT WIND HE HIRED A SOLDIER OF FORTUNE TO MUSTRE AND ARMY AND SO PROMPTLY INVADED THE NEIGHBOURING ISLAND WITH THE SAME CLAIM TO INTEREST. IT IS LIKELY HE FORGAVE MANY BAD DEBTS TO HIS ARISTOCRACY LOYALS.
AS WELL AS HOW THEY GOT THE DOUGH WHAT WERE THE LOANS TAKEN OUT FOR?
A DIVERSION IN THE CONTEXT OF LUNAR SOCIETY WHERE DOCUMENTATION IS SURELY PRECISE.
YET HOW WAS THE FUNDING RESRVOIR GENERATED AND WHO BENEFITTED AS REPAYMENT?
 
UPDATE,
Boulton,s Soho House will re-open to the public on 8th April 2006 (According to today,s Solihull Times) ::)
 
Why don't we go to Boulton's House some time this Spring or Summer? It is really worth visiting. and then we can do the Black Eagle pub, where Sylvia keeps going. I revisited after the tram opened, the first time for 45 years [verdict:good]. The house has a lot of interesting things to offer, and it's FREE.
Meanwhile I'm doing the Jewellery Quarter Museum on Saturday 4 March about 2.00, after the Church Tavern from 12.30. It would be nice to meet anyone who can make it.
Peter.
 
Just found out my Relation (on the wifes side "Sorry") Nicholas Juxon 1782 had shares in The Rose Copper Company were Watt and Boulton were shareholders
 
Memorial in Birmingham Cathedral (St Philip's Cathedral) to William Small. For a time he was in the 13 American Colonies (preceding the birth of the USA) and returned to England in 1765. He died in 1775 and is buried at St Philip's. He taught future US President Thomas Jefferson.

 
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