Title: Early Student Microscope

Identifier: LL02.48.01.35   (https://digital.lib.ecu.edu/22109)

Description: This instrument is an early American microscope. It is labeled "James W. Queen & Co. Maker Phila." There is an evaluation of the prototype in the Journal of the Franklin Institute in 1855. An advertisement by Queen from 1859 illustrates the simpler model without the fine adjustment. The fine adjustment mechanism is similar to those used by Smith and Beck for their student microscope (E9) and by the Grunow Brothers for some of their early instruments. Identical microscopes are known labeled G. Langguth, Jr. and Samuel Murset. Langguth was a retailer in Chicago. Murset was a Swiss immigrant instrument maker with a shop at 86 North 7th Street in the 1855 and 1856 Philadelphia directories. He is known to have performed contract work for Queen. It is most probable that Murset is the actual manufacturer of these microscopes.