Early American Science: a selective guide to materials at the British Library

Abstract

• By the early eighteenth century the American colonies were well established along the eastern seaboard. In many respects, their economic development until this point had been remarkable. So, too, were the advances they had made in self-government. By the 1720s trade between the colonies was increasing; transport links were improving; the postal service was becoming more frequent and reliable and newspapers were circulating more widely. Relative to Europeans, most colonists enjoyed a high standard of living and in many towns the creation of an elite class was well under way. Regarding their ability to participate in and contribute to the new scientific thinking, however, the colonies were distinctly disadvantaged. They lacked not only the great libraries, universities and endowed institutions of Europe but also the possibility of support from enlightened patrons. Despite this, the ideas of the Enlightenment enthused many throughout the colonies. Great efforts were made to advance science not only in New England, which had been regarded as the cultural capital of the colonies, but also the Southern and Middle colonies, with Philadelphia – home to Benjamin Franklin and birthplace of the American Philosophical Society – taking up this challenge to great effect. Some of the subjects of the colonists’ enthusiasm are outlined briefly below; this is then followed by a selective bibliography of their works, all of which are held in the British Library. Natural phenomena: meteors, earthquakes and the transit of Venus… Although the colonists contributed comparatively little in the way of original scientific thought, they did provide significant observations and descriptions of natural phenomena. The transit of Venus across the sun in both 1761 and 1769 provided a particularly valuable opportunity. Since the 1761 transit was not observable from within the geographical limits of the settled colonies, Professor John Winthrop, Hollis Professor of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy at Harvard, travelled with two students and Harvard’s best apparatus to St John’s, Newfoundland. Their observations, together with those made by others in locations across the globe, expanded existing knowledge about the dimensions of the solar system. Eight years later, the 1769 transit could be observed throughout the colonies. In Philadelphia, under the leadership of the astronomer and surveyor David Rittenhouse, the American Philosophical Society erected three observation platforms, one of which – outside the Pennsylvania State House – was later used for the first public reading of the Declaration of Independence. Scientific observations were also made in Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Delaware and New Jersey. The observation of earthquakes, comets and meteors also provided colonists with an opportunity to contribute to the wider scientific community and here, too, John Winthrop played a major role. Up until the early eighteenth century, earthquakes were invariably regarded as acts of God; indeed, nearly all of the responses to the New England earthquake in 1727 were sermons. By the time of the Lisbon and New England earthquakes in 1755 this was beginning to change. For example, although Thomas Prince immediately chose to reprint his 1727 sermon, Earthquakes the Works of God and Tokens of his Just Displeasure, he added an appendix suggesting a secondary cause of the earthquake to be the numerous lightning rods throughout the city of Boston. John Winthrop then publicly countered this proposition with the publication of his own insights about this event, first given in lecture to his Harvard students. He notably described the shocks as a ‘kind of undulatory motion’ or a ‘wave of earth’ and decried Prince’s lightning rod thesis as proof of the contemporary fashion for citing “electricity” as an explanation for everything. In the subsequent newspaper debate between the two men, Winthrop was said by Jared Eliot to have ‘laid Mr Prince flat on [his] back.’ Disease and inoculation Not surprisingly, the cause, prevention and cure of a wide variety of diseases were the focus of many scientific tracts published in the colonies and during the early years of the Republic. In particular, the smallpox epidemic in Boston in 1721 and the yellow fever epidemic in Philadelphia in 1793 garnered much attention. Smallpox outbreaks occurred in the colonies throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth century; indeed, it was the introduction of smallpox by Europeans in the sixteenth century that decimated the indigenous population. By the early 1700s it was widely known that survivors of smallpox were immune to later occurrences of the disease. Variolation, a type of inoculation, was practised in many countries and reports of such practices appeared in the Royal Society’s Philosophical Transactions in the 1710s. During the 1721 epidemic in Boston, in which more than 800 people eventually died, a passionate debate about inoculation took place. Supporting the practice was the Reverend Cotton Mather, whose wife and three children had died in a measles epidemic. Years earlier, Mather’s slave had told him how he had been inoculated as a child in Africa. Mather later read about smallpox inoculation in the Transactions. Following the outbreak of the disease in 1721, he inoculated his own son and, together with Dr Zabdiel Boylston, urged physicians in Boston to inoculate as many people as possible. Yet most of the city’s doctors, together with much of the population, believed instead that inoculation would only hasten the spread of the disease. Many regarded smallpox as part of God’s will and some argued that since inoculation originated in Africa, Asia and the Middle East it was a heathen practice unsuitable for Christians. The first major American yellow fever epidemic occurred in July 1793 in Philadelphia – then capital of the United States – and also prompted much enquiry. Although yellow fever is now known to be spread by infected mosquitoes, at the end of the eighteenth century it was generally believed that it was a contagious disease that originated amidst putrefying matter. Within the first month of the outbreak, one tenth of city’s residents had died and thousands soon fled to the countryside for safety, including President George Washington and most national and state officials. In the absence of political leadership from the legislature, the mayor’s plea for help was answered by several key residents. Together, they created a desperately needed hospital and sanatorium and a system for burying the dead. Although physician Benjamin Rush, signatory to the Declaration of Independence, urged copious bloodletting and purging as a cure for the disease, most doctors disagreed. Indeed, the argument about the most effective treatment would rage for several years as not only Philadelphia, but also Baltimore, New Haven and New York were hit by epidemics. It was not until 1881 that it was first proposed that yellow fever was spread by mosquitoes and in the 1930s two vaccines were developed, one of which is still in use today. The US suffered its last major outbreak of the disease in 1905. Climate, geography and the environment… Other scientific topics of particular interest to the colonists included the climate, geography and the natural environment. It soon became apparent to the early settlers that predictions about the North American climate could not be based upon those experienced at the same latitude in Europe: the bitter winters and short growing season of New England, which lay well south of London, were early proof of this. Observations about this unfamiliar weather and the new and challenging environment appeared in the earliest colonial writings. In particular, the authors commented upon their potential impact upon human health and the ability to develop the land. Not surprisingly, such observations continued in the writings of settlers and travellers as the nation continued moved westward throughout the nineteenth century. But in the early/mid eighteenth century the American climate was also being linked by physicians and natural and moral philosophers to the development of civilization itself. Clearing the forests and cultivating the land were regarded as actions that would not only tame the wilderness but also ‘civilise’ the climate, bringing it ever more in line with that of Europe. Evidence that the climate did actually change significantly during this time is hard to find; yet written records clearly show the colonists’ belief that this was so. Through their own labour and efforts, they perceived themselves to be carving out of the wilderness an environment and a climate quite different to the one that had existed pre-contact. They interpreted differences as encouraging signs of progress, permanence and the potential to thrive. Note on the Bibliography: Please note that in the bibliography that follows, the shelf-mark for each item is given in parentheses. For most authors, birth and death dates are provided; however, in some cases these have not been traced. The contributions of those living in the American colonies to the Royal Society’s Philosophical Transactions are not included in this bibliography but can be consulted in the British Library Reading Rooms.