The collection is open for research use. Viewing film portion of collection requires special appointment. See repository for details.
Collection Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Reproduction permission from Archives Center: fees for commercial use.
Collection Citation:
American Petroleum Institute Photograph and Film Collection, 1860s-1990 (bulk 1955-1990), Archives Center, National Museum of American History
The collection is open for research use. Viewing film portion of collection requires special appointment. See repository for details.
Collection Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Reproduction permission from Archives Center: fees for commercial use.
Collection Citation:
American Petroleum Institute Photograph and Film Collection, 1860s-1990 (bulk 1955-1990), Archives Center, National Museum of American History
The collection documents Elliott's work in developing the SpectraSpan Spectrometer and related technologies including the use of echelle gratings and argon plasmas with the spectrometer. It also documents his companies, SpectraMetrics, and Elliott Laboratories. The collection contains correspondence; photographs, including lantern slides; business and financial records; writings; laboratory notes; internal company reports; user's manuals; patents and patent-related papers; and publications and printed materials.
Arrangement:
1 series.
Biographical / Historical:
William G. Elliott was an engineer who, in 1966, founded SpectraMetrics, which developed and marketed the SpectraSpan echelle spectrometer. He later sold SpectraMetrics, and founded Elliott Laboratories in 1972.
Provenance:
Collection donated by Mark Elliott.
Restrictions:
Collection open for research on site by appointment. Unprotected photographs must be handled with gloves.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
The papers of art conservator and historian, engineer, and professor Daniel Varney Thompson (1902-1980) are dated 1848-1979, with the bulk of the material dated 1923-1979. The collection measures 10.1 linear feet and consists of biographical material, correspondence, subject files, writings, artwork, printed material, and photographs.
Scope and Content Note:
The papers of art conservator and historian, professor, engineer, and writer Daniel Varney Thompson (1902-1980) are dated 1848-1979, with the bulk of the material dated 1923-1979. The collection measures 10.1 linear feet and consists of biographical material, correspondence, subject files, writings, artwork, printed material, and photographs.
Biographical information includes certificates and diplomas, passports, and wills. Correspondence documents Daniel Varney Thompson's personal and professional life. Personal correspondence centers heavily on family members including his brother, the composer Randall Thompson. Professional correspondence concerns Thompson's academic career, research, writing, and work as a technical consultant and engineer. Among the correspondents are colleagues from Harvard, Yale, the Courtauld Institute, publishers, and academic and technical journals, in addition to corporate clients.
Subject files are comprised of varying correspondence, printed matter, photographs, notes and writings relating to Thompson's areas of interest. Personal and professional subject files include many relating to his research interests and engineering consulting projects. Of particular interest are numerous letters from Bernard Berenson. There is also correspondence with Belle da Costa Greene, as well as files concerning the Kermes beetle (a source of crimson dyes in the middle ages). Food and gardening subject files reflect Thompson's career as a writer and columnist on these subjects.
Writings consist mainly of manuscripts, drafts, research and miscellaneous notes; also included are diaries, poems, miscellaneous items, and a music score. Daniel Varney Thompson's personal and professional writings include two diaries, poems, and student writings. Most of his extant writings are on art-related topics, science and technology. Among the notes is an index to medieval manuscripts on craftsmanship in major European libraries was compiled by Thompson in 1935. His work on the subject remains unpublished and his notes are extremely valuable since some of the materials noted were lost in World War II. Scientific and technical notebooks, along with various wirings and reports, document projects undertaken as a technical consultant and engineer. The food and gardening writings are extensive and consist of manuscripts and notes for articles and columns, and for a book-length compilation of these writings. Among the writings by other authors are diaries of his mother and wife, and a music score by his brother, Randall Thompson.
Artwork by Daniel Varney Thompson, Mary Sargent McKean, and Henry Winslow consists of drawings, prints, watercolors, a sketchbook, and an oil painting. Printed material includes articles and book reviews by Daniel Varney Thompson, and items about or mentioning him and his family. Also found are articles and books about art, history, medieval studies, science and technology, and food and gardening topics.
Photographs are of artwork, people, places and miscellaneous subjects. Images of people are mainly Thompson and family members.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged as 7 series.
Series 1: Biographical Information, 1848-1970s (Box 1, OV 11-12; 0.3 linear ft.)
Series 2: Correspondence, 1914-1979 (Boxes 1-3; 2.0 linear ft.)
Series 3: Subject Files, 1925-1979 (Boxes 3-6; 3.0 linear ft.)
Series 4: Writings, 1907-1970s (Boxes 6-9; 2.85 linear ft.)
Series 5: Artwork, 1923-1934 (Box 9, OV 13; 5 folders)
Series 6: Printed Material, 1917-1979 (Box 9; 0.75 linear ft.)
Series 7: Photographs, circa 1900-1972 (Box 10; 0.4 linear ft.)
Biographical Note:
Daniel Varney Thompson (1902-1980) was an art conservator and historian, professor, engineer, and writer. A noted authority on medieval painting, Varney lived and worked primarily in the Boston area and London.
Daniel Varney Thompson was born in New Jersey in 1902. He was the son of Grace Randall Thompson and Daniel Varney Thompson, Sr., a classics teacher at the Lawrenceville School and later headmaster of Boston Latin School. American composer Randall Thompson was his older brother. Following family tradition, Thompson attended Harvard, earning the A.B. in 1922 and A.M. in 1926, focusing his attention on fine arts, physical chemistry, and literature. Daniel V. Thompson stopped using the designation Jr. after his father's death in 1932.
Between 1922 and 1925 Thompson was employed in the Fogg Museum's laboratory devoted to analyzing art materials for the purposes of detecting forgeries, preserving works of art, and devising methods to aid working artists. During this period, Thompson went to Italy as a Sheldon Fellow in Fine Arts, to learn medieval fresco painting techniques from Edward W. Forbes, Director of the Fogg Museum. He also had an opportunity to study medieval and Renaissance painting techniques with Inicio Federico Joni, and while in Italy began life-long friendships with the Forbes family and Bernard Berenson. Thompson served as a technical advisor to the 1924-1925 Second Harvard China Expedition; he traveled to China by way of India, where he studied wall paintings in caves at Ajanta and Elura and researched newly discovered scrolls.
Daniel Varney Thompson was on the faculty of Yale from 1926-1933, where he taught art history, and tempera painting courses, and laid the foundation for the Department of Fine Arts when Yale became a university in 1932. During his time at Yale, Thompson married Cecile [Cecily] de Luze Simonds.
When The American Council of Learned Societies awarded Thompson a research fellowship for the academic year 1933/34, he returned to Europe and surveyed major libraries for materials concerning the history of technology of the arts. Thompson was then invited to be Professor of the History of Technology at the University of London. He was on the faculty from 1934-1946, and also served as research and technical advisor, developing a laboratory at the Courtauld Institute for analysis of art materials.
During World War II, the Courtauld's laboratory - which had facilities for emission, absorption, and x-ray spectrography - was offered to the Ministry of Aircraft Production. To avoid compromising the University's tax-free status, Thompson formed and served as managing director of Daniel Varney Limited, a private company which leased the premises and equipment. From 1940 to 1945, the company was operated in the name of the Courtauld Institute, employing 200 people in tool making, gauge making, fine mechanisms, and development and production of optics instruments. After the war, Daniel Varney Limited shifted its interests to high vacuum diffusion pumps, gas manipulation, and glassblowing.
Upon returning to the United States in 1947, Thompson settled in the Boston area, becoming a technical consultant. He worked on projects for E-Z Mills, Inc., Sylvania Eloctronics, Comstock & Wescott, Inc., and other corporations. He was chief engineer of Jarrell-Ash Co., 1953-1955, redesigning optical instruments, spectrography, and schlieren systems. Between 1955 and 1957, Thompson served as Vice President of Swett & Sibley, involved with the design and development of optical instruments, scanning spectrometers, and densistometers. He then moved to Avco Corporation, where for the next decade he was a Senior Staff Consultant working on optical design in rocket instrumentation. Thompson retired from his engineering career in 1967.
Daniel V. Thompson wrote and published extensively. Art-related writings include translations and a monograph published by Yale University Press, and numerous articles and reviews. Translations are: Cennino Cennini's Il Libro dell'Arte (3 volumes: Text of Il Libro dell'Arte, 1932; The Craftsman's Handbook, 1933; and The Practice of Tempera Painting, 1936), and An Anonymous Fourteenth Century Treatise ( De arte illuminadi) (with his student George Heard Hamilton), 1936. A monograph, The Materials and Techniques of Medieval Painting (foreword by Bernard Berenson) appeared in 1936.
Most of Thompson's scientific and technical writings are unpublished and relate to projects for which he served as a consulting engineer.
Soon after retiring, Thompson began a new career that he continued for the remainder of his life. A serious cook and long-time gardener, he began writing about these topics, producing weekly columns that were published by newspapers from Maine to Chicago and contributing articles to Gourmet, Horticulture, and similar periodicals. Thompson also lectured to garden clubs and judged garden and flower competitions.
Daniel Varney Thompson died on January 4, 1980, following an automobile accident in Malaga, Spain.
Related Material:
Also found in the Archives of American Art are oral history interviews conducted with Daniel V. Thompson by Robert Brown, September 25, 1974-November 2, 1976. There are also three letters from Thompson to his sister-in-law Edith Simonds Moore.
Provenance:
The Daniel Varney Thompson papers were donated to the Archives of American Art in increments between 1974-1981 by Mr. Thompson and his estate.
Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment.
Rights:
The Archives of American Art makes its archival collections available for non-commercial, educational and personal use unless restricted by copyright and/or donor restrictions, including but not limited to access and publication restrictions. AAA makes no representations concerning such rights and restrictions and it is the user's responsibility to determine whether rights or restrictions exist and to obtain any necessary permission to access, use, reproduce and publish the collections. Please refer to the Smithsonian's Terms of Use for additional information.
Collection documents the professional career and business interests of inventor Serge A. Scherbatskoy, who specialized in petroleum geophysics. Papers include laboratory notebooks, license agreements, correspondence, blue line prints, patent litigation files, newspaper clippings, reference files, patents, promotional literature, and audio-visual materials.
Scope and Contents:
The Scherbatskoy papers provide insight into the relationship between inventors and the United States oil industry between the 1930s and 1990s, the evolution of the history of applied geophysics, and the development of technological innovation in oil prospecting, specifically applied and geophysics. One of the strengths of the collection is the patents Scherbatskoy pursued, renewed, or impeded. As sole proprietor of his own company, Geophysical Measurements Corp., Scherbatskoy meticulously constructed an international patenting program which made him a successful player among the giants of the oil industry. Another highlight of the collection is Scherbatskoy's fifteen laboratory notebooks that include his well logging work notes and drawings. Legal files illustrating litigation over the infringement of Scherbatskoy's patents are also found in the collection. The papers demonstrate how the oil prospecting industry worked from scientific, commercial and legal perspectives. The bulk of the papers are arranged chronologically to reflect the timeline of Scherbatskoy's career. Due to the limited number of personal materials, Scherbatskoy's personal papers are placed at the end of the series list.
Series 1, World War II Work, 1935-2002, is divided into three subseries and includes information on Scherbatskoy's relationship with physicists Bruno Pontecorvo (1913-1993) and Jacob Neufeld (1906-2000). Neufeld and Scherbatskoy worked on the application of nuclear physics to geophysical prospecting. Neufeld would later join the staff of Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Materials include a file about Pontecorvo, Neufeld's laboratory notebook, and some correspondence between Neufeld and Scherbatskoy. This series also includes materials on Scherbatskoy's well logging projects during and after World War II.
Series 2, Invention Laboratory Journals and Drawings, 1958-1992, is further divided into two subseries and includes fifteen laboratory journals and a folder of drawings related to Scherbatskoy's well logging work. The journals are arranged numerically by journal number. In some instances, journal numbers repeat. Journals are paginated and include drawings, tipped-in graphs and charts, and notes relating to Scherbatskoy's well logging work. Some of the notebooks include pages signed by a witness, which Scherbatskoy could use as evidence to prove his ownership of a particular well logging invention idea.
Series 3, Radio Corporation of America (RCA), 1946, 1948, is comprised of one folder with a license agreement between Scherbatskoy and Radio Corporation of America for magnetic recording systems.
Series 4, Canadian Geophysical Measurements Corporation (GMC), 1957-2002, is divided into three subseries and provides information on Scherbatskoy's company Canadian Geophysical Measurements Corporation. Materials include license agreements, correspondence, and Canadian Geophysical Measurements vs. Computalog Gearhart, Ltd litigation files.
Series 5, ARPS Corporation (Jan J. Arps), 1960-1995, includes information on Arps Corporation, organized by Scherbatskoy, Jacob Neufeld, and Jan J. Arps in Dallas, TX to develop and practice measurement while drilling. The Arps Corporation materials are comprised of administrative and financial records, business correspondence, contracts of consultation, patents, license agreements, and Scherbatskoy's stock information.
Series 6, Gearhart-Owen Industries (GOI) (Gearhart Industries, Inc., (GII)), 1961-1996, is divided into seven subseries and consists of records generated during Scherbatskoy's measurement while drilling (MWD™) work with Gearhart-Owen Industries, Inc. One of the largest series in the collection, the Gearhart-Owen materials include license agreements, correspondence, litigation files, measurement while drilling reports and blue line prints of measurement while drilling equipment, signal extraction measurement while drilling study reports, reference materials, and United States, United Kingdom, and Canadian patent assignments between Scherbatskoy, Gearhart-Owen, and the Scherbatskoy Family Trust. Included in the litigation subseries is the Scherbatskoy Family Trust vs. Gearhart Industries, Inc., case. The Scherbatskoy Family Trust in 1975 sued for royalty payments due Scherbatskoy under the Scherbatskoy Gearhart-Owen Agreement on nuclear well logging technology and measurement while drilling. The case was settled in the late 1980s, and Gearhart Industries, Inc., paid royalties to the Scherbatskoy Family Trust. Gearhart materials are also present in Series 7, 8 and 9.
Series 7, Halliburton Company, 1978-1999, is divided into four subseries and includes license agreements, lawsuits and patent infringements, patents, and company acquisitions. This series documents Scherbatskoy's relationship with the Halliburton Company pre-and post-Halliburton's acquisition of Gearhart Industries in the 1980s. Halliburton materials are also in Series 8 and 10.
Series 8, Other Professional Work, 1964-1999, is divided into twelve subseries: McCullough Tool Company, Exploration Logging, Inc., Eastman Whipstock, Schlumberger, Ltd., Sperry-Sun Well Surveying Company, Christensen, Inc., Gunn and Kuffner (attorneys), NL Industries, Inc., Baker Oil Tools, Inc., AMF Scientific Drilling International, Inc., Geolink (UK) Ltd., Technolink (Cyprus), Ltd., and Computalog Gearhart, Ltd. In addition to providing information on oil prospecting companies that Scherbatskoy consulted with during his career, materials also include correspondence between Scherbatskoy and attorneys Gunn and Kuffner relating to Scherbatskoy's well logging patent rights.
Series 9, Well Logging Research Materials, 1937-2002, includes correspondence, papers, reports, promotional literature, and general research files relating to Scherbatskoy's well logging research.
Series 10, Licensing Agreements, 1961-1989, contains four folders documenting the nuclear well logging agreement between oil prospecting companies such as Gearhart Owen, Halliburton, Geophysical Measurements, Inc., and Welex Jet Services. Both Marvin Gearhart and Harold Owen of Gearhart-Owen had been employees of Welex before founding Gearhart-Owen Industries.
Series 11, Patents, 1937-1998, includes copies of patents issued to, among others, Scherbatskoy, Robert E. Fearon (inventor), James Upchurch (inventor), John Westlake (inventor), Mobil Oil Corp and Exxon. Materials also include patent applications, patent protests, patent annuities, and correspondence with the United States Patent Trademark Organization and the German Trademark Office.
Series 12, Personal Materials, 1925-1983, includes materials on Scherbatskoy's immigration to the United States, school diplomas, and memorial book. Visual materials include original photographs, and color copies of original photographs of Scherbatskoy as an adult, his family, and his inventions. Also included is a 1944 submarine training 16mm reel-to-reel film and an audio cassette tape of Scherbatskoy discussing his World War II work with his daughter Mary Scherbatskoy.
Arrangement:
Collection arranged into twelve series.
Series 1, World War II Work, 1935-2002
Subseries 1, Relationship with Bruno Pontecorvo, 1940-2002
Subseries 2, Relationship with Jacob Neufeld, 1935-1954
Subseries 3, Scherbatskoy Well Logging Project, 1940-1951
Series 2, Invention Journals and Drawings, 1958-1992
Subseries 2, John E. Westlake (Inventor) Patents, 1972-1996
Subseries 3, James M. Upchurch (Inventor) Patents, 1990-1998
Subseries 4, Other, 1943-1997
Series 12, Personal Materials, 1925-1983
Subseries 1, Personal Papers, 1925-1966
Subseries 2, Photographs, circa 1950s, undated
Subseries 3, Audio Visual Materials, 1944, 1983
Biographical / Historical:
Serge Alexander Scherbatskoy (1908-2002), a petroleum geophysical engineer, held more than 200 patents worldwide in petroleum exploration. Scherbatskoy was born July 18, 1908, in Buyuk Dere, Turkey, a suburb of Constantinople where his father, Alexander Ippolitovich Scherbatskoy, was Third Secretary to the Russian Embassy. After the Russian Revolution of 1917, Alexander Ippolitovich planned to accept a post in the Kerensky government. When that fell, he joined the League of Nations offices in Berlin. Later, he moved the family to Paris where he was employed by Yokohama Specie Bank. Young Serge completed his education at the Sorbonne, earning a degree in physics in 1926.
In 1929, only months before the stock market crash, Scherbatskoy immigrated to the United States. He worked for Bell Labs in New York City from 1929 to 1932. While there, Scherbatskoy worked on the Type C Carrier telephone system, assisted in the Reproduction of Music in Auditory Perspective (the first Hi Fi) and invented an automatic volume control using copper oxide semiconductors, for which the patent was denied. About this time, he met Mary Ellen Dunham; they married in 1938 and had four children: Mary, Serge, Timothy, and Jonathan.
After being laid off from Bell Labs in 1932, Scherbatskoy held a number of odd jobs. He organized the "Bureau of Radio Engineering" to repair radios house-to-house. In 1933, he went to the University of Pennsylvania under a grant from the Works Progress Administration (later Work Projects Administration; WPA) and assisted with developing a "sound prism" (i.e., spectrometer). He worked for PHILCO Radio and Television Corporation from 1933 to 1934 where he developed a "sweeping frequency" oscillator for testing radios. About 1936, Scherbatskoy headed west to Tulsa, Oklahoma, and joined Seismograph Services Corporation. While at Seismograph, he developed the "Expander" and the "Automatic Signal Control" for use in seismographic exploration.
Scherbatskoy left Seismograph Corp. and, with Bill Green and Jerry Westby, started Well Surveys Incorporated in 1937 to develop his idea of nuclear logging of cased wells. In nuclear logging, logs are obtained by using radiation sources in the logging tool. Well Surveys was one of the first American companies that applied nuclear physics to oil prospecting. Standard Oil of New York financed the project, but various parties could not agree and they dissolved the Well Surveys Incorporated.
According to an audiotaped interview conducted by Scherbatskoy's daughter Mary, during World War II Serge Scherbatskoy worked for the U.S. Navy as an independent prime contractor to develop the lethal probability integrator (aircraft gunner training simulator) and other projects. Scherbatskoy also was involved tangentially with the Manhattan Project. As part of the Project, Scherbatskoy was recruited by Gilbert LaBine (1890-1977), a Canadian prospector who discovered radium and uranium deposits at Port Radium, Northwest Territories in 1930. Known as the father of Canada's uranium industry, LaBine was president of Eldorado Mining and Refining Limited from its start in the late 1920s to 1947. Scherbatskoy developed a portable radiation detector and headed a team pioneering this form of uranium exploration near Great Bear Lake, Canada, during 1944, locating deposits used in atomic weapons production.
In 1948, Scherbatskoy formed Geophysical Measurements Corporation (GMC) in Tulsa, Oklahoma. During this time, Scherbatskoy worked on the development of well logging technology. "Well logging is the process of exploring systematically the entire length of a drill hole by means of an instrument capable of measuring physical factors associated with the rocks traversed and producing a graph."1 In December 1960, Scherbatskoy, Jan J. Arps (physicist), and Jacob Neufeld (physicist) joined together with Reinholdt & Gardner (a brokerage firm) to form a limited partnership named Arps Corp. to assign, sell and license patents. The purpose was to lease to the oil industry, equipment utilizing the patented Arps process for continuous telemetering to the earth's surface of measurements made at the bottom of a borehole while drilling.
In 1964, GMC conducted a stock swap with McCullough Tool which then went bankrupt in 1968. During the 1970s, Scherbatskoy's activities included consulting with Jacob Neufeld of Oak Ridge National Laboratories. In 1973 he began a relationship with Marvin Gearhart of Gearhart-Owen Industries of Dallas, Texas. Gearhart-Owen was an instrument and oil services firm originally founded by Marvin Gearhart and Harold Owen in 1955. In 1980, Marvin Gearhart changed the name from Gearhart -Owen to Gearhart Industries, Inc., "The GO Company." Scherbatskoy was named Director of Special Projects and continued his own patent program which developed "Measurement While Drilling" and directional drilling patents.
"Measurement While Drilling" (MWD) refers to measurements acquired down hole while drilling that specifically describe directional surveying and drilling-related measurements. "Logging While Drilling" (LWD) refers to petrophysical measurements, similar to open hole wireline logs, acquired while drilling. Wireline logs are a cabling technology used by operators of oil and gas wells to lower equipment into the well. Directional drilling is the science of drilling non-vertical wells. These systems—MWD and LWD—are based on mud telemetry which is the transmission of encoded data through a drilling rig's drilling mud system using rapid fluctuations in the pressure of a closed loop circulating system.
When Gearhart-Owen went bankrupt in 1986, it was acquired by Halliburton. Scherbatskoy worked at Gearhart-Owen until 1988, when he opened his own office in Fort Worth developing Measurement While Drilling patents. Scherbatskoy died on November 25, 2002 in Fort Worth, Texas.
Source
Oil and Gas Journal, February 22, 1940, p. 62.
Related Materials:
The Scherbatskoy Papers complement the Philip Bishop Collection documenting petroleum prospecting and extraction in the Museum's Modern Physics Collection and the American Petroleum Institute (API) Photograph and Film Collection (AC0711) in the Archives Center. The API Collection documents all aspects of the production of oil, including exploration, drilling, cracking, refineries, pipelines, tankers, storage tanks, service stations, and the numerous products other than gasoline produced by the petroleum industry.
The Division of Science, Medicine and Society (now Division of Medicine and Science) holds three prototypes related to this collection. See accession 2007.0212.
Provenance:
The collection was donated by Serge A. Scherbatskoy's daughter, Mary Scherbatskoy, and three sons, Serge Scherbatskoy, Jr., Timothy Scherbatskoy, and Jonathan Scherbatskoy, on 2007
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research but is stored off-site and special arrangements must be made to work with it. Contact the Archives Center for information at archivescenter@si.edu or 202-633-3270.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning intellectual property rights. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
This collection contains a diverse selection of materials that address a variety of aspects of the ITT Industrial Laboratories in Fort Wayne, Indiana. There are research and development notebooks from various scientists and engineers, reports and articles on products being developed and research being conducted, technical drawings, a large body of product information, and photographs of products and research projects. People represented in the collection include: George Papp, Hans W.G. Salinger, Philo T. Farnsworth, Madison Cawein, Robert L. Hirsch, Sanford F. Essig, H.J. Lott, and Edward H. Eberhardt. When these materials came to the Archives Center a portion of them were housed in envelopes with captions written on them. The envelopes were photocopied to preserve the information and the contents were incorporated into the above series in order to facilitate intellectual access to the materials.
Arrangement:
The collection is divided into six series
Series 1: Company Records, 1937-1984
Series 2: George Papp, 1938-1964
Series 3: Hans W.G. Salinger, 1944-1945
Series 4: Research Records, 1934-1969
Series 5: Product Information, 1955-1979
Series 6: Photographs, 1960-1965
Biographical / Historical:
The ITT Corporation Industrial Research Laboratories, Electron Tube Division's laboratories in Fort Wayne, Indiana conducted research and product development in the field of special purpose vacuum tubes and sensors. Their history in the research and development of these special purpose devices originated in Fort Wayne in 1939, when Philo T. Farnsworth, the inventor of television, moved there. What brought him there was that his company, Farnsworth Television and Radio Corporation, purchased the Capehart Incorporated plant in Fort Wayne.
Rather than build a plant of their own, Farnsworth Television and Radio Corporation decided to purchase the plant, which had a reputation for building quality phonographs, and retool it to build radio and television receivers. Farnsworth and his engineers' research at the plant lead to the invention of numerous devices, including amplifier tubes, cathode-ray tubes, vacuum tubes, electron multipliers, and photoelectric materials.
The laboratories in Fort Wayne were responsible for developing new technical concepts, methods and designs of tubes, sensors and devices for application in industrial, government and commercial markets. Laboratory activities included applied research, advanced development and product design, and development and fabrication. They concentrated their efforts on designing and developing components which operated in the infrared, visible and ultraviolet portions of the electromagnetic spectrum.
Their various areas of research and development led to a diverse offering of products, including: multiplier phototubes (for stellar observation, star tracking, laser detection, vibration analysis, scintillation counting); vacuum photodiodes (for laser detection, scintillation detection, high speed switching, solar radiation monitoring, interference detection); image dissectors (for slow scan TV systems, slide projector readers, industrial process control, electronic star trackers, electronic scanning spectrometers); electron multipliers (for space research, radiation detection, vacuum monochromators, single particle counting, demountable vacuum systems), image converters (for high-speed photography, infrared viewing and surveillance, optical correlation, pulsed light systems, ultraviolet detection and viewing), correlation devices (for motion compensation, area correlation, map reading, document reading, tracking), and accessories (for focusing magnets, image dissector cameras, focusing and deflection coil assemblies and yokes, phototube holders, power supplies).
The Tube and Sensor Laboratories were world leaders in the areas of photometric quantum detectors, image devices, camera tubes, and optical pattern correlators. Some of their major developments included the Star Tracker sensors used in the Lunar Orbiter Program, Vidissector camera tubes used in several observational satellites, and the cockpit display storage tubes used in the F105 Thunderchief and A4D Skyhawk fighter planes.
They were innovators in developing a number of specialized high vacuum devices including: image dissectors, star tracking dissectors and multiplier phototubes, single quantum counting photomultipliers, grid-controlled photomultipliers, biplanar and laser monitoring photodiodes, windowless electron multipliers and single particle detectors, ultraviolet sensitive photodiodes, image converters, image storage and image correlation tubes, and spectral response information.
Throughout the collection there are numerous names that the laboratories were known as that reflects different stages in the company's development. What follows is a chronology of the names of the laboratories in Fort Wayne, Indiana:
1929 – Capehart Corporation
1936 – Capehart, Inc.
1938 – Farnsworth Television & Radio Corporation
1949 – Capehart-Farnsworth Corporation
1953 – Capehart-Farnsworth Company, Division of ITT
1954 – Farnsworth Electronics Company, Division of ITT
1958 – ITT Laboratories, Division of ITT
1960 – ITT Federal Laboratories
1962 – ITT Industrial Laboratories
1969 – ITT Electron Tube Division, Tube and Sensor Laboratories
1973 – ITT Electro-Optical Products Division, Tube and Sensor Laboratories
Related Materials:
130 vacuum tubes, many related to Philo Farnsworth were donated to the Division of Information Technology & Society (now Division of Medicine and Science), National Museum of American History.
Provenance:
ITT donated the collection to the Division of Information, Technology & Society, National Museum of American History through Elaine Tuttle, Vice President of Director of Contracts on September 4, 1992. The collection was transferred to the Archives Center on September 13, 2002.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
General, includes photos of a vacuum compton detector, an electrostatic vidicon, a UV photometer display unit, an electronic scanning spectrometer, and other electron tubes and laboratory equipment (33 photographs), 1960
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Collection Citation:
ITT Industrial Laboratories Electron Tube Research Records, 1934-1984, Archives Center, National Museum of American History.
Instrumentation, includes photos of various video equipment, an electronic scanning spectrometer, a Corning flaw detector, a Corning lens inspector, a camera pad amplifier, and a multiple access computer (27 photographs), 1960
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Collection Citation:
ITT Industrial Laboratories Electron Tube Research Records, 1934-1984, Archives Center, National Museum of American History.
Collection is open for research but is stored off-site and special arrangements must be made to work with it. Contact the Archives Center for information at archivescenter@si.edu or 202-633-3270.
Collection Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Collection Citation:
National Company (NATCO) Atomic Clocks Records, 1955-1968, Archives Center, National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution.
United States. National Aeronautics and Space Administration Search this
National Air and Space Museum (U.S.). Division of Space History Search this
Extent:
0.39 Cubic feet ((1 box))
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Reports
Date:
bulk 1969-1972
2019
Summary:
This collection consists of a complete set of printed stowage lists, including revisions lists, from the Apollo 11, 12, 14, 15, 16, and 17 missions. The collection also includes fully searchable pdf files of the lists created in 2019 by a special project initiated by the National Air and Space Museum's Department of Space History and executed by the Smithsonian's Transcription Center.
Scope and Contents:
This collection consists of a complete set of printed stowage lists, including revisions lists, from the Apollo 11, 12, 14, 15, 16, and 17 missions. The collection also includes fully searchable pdf files of the lists created in 2019 by a special project initiated by the National Air and Space Museum's Department of Space History and executed by the Smithsonian's Transcription Center.
Arrangement:
This collection is arranged by mission.
Biographical / Historical:
At the time of each Apollo mission launch, NASA prepared a set of printed "as flown" stowage lists to document what items were stored on the spacecraft (both the Command Module and Lunar Module), as well as which items were to be transferred from one spacecraft to another.
Provenance:
NASM's Space History Department, Transfer, 2015, NASM.2015.0018
Restrictions:
No restrictions on access.
Rights:
Material is subject to Smithsonian Terms of Use. Should you wish to use NASM material in any medium, please submit an Application for Permission to Reproduce NASM Material, available at Permissions Requests
Material is subject to Smithsonian Terms of Use. Should you wish to use NASM material in any medium, please submit an Application for Permission to Reproduce NASM Material, available at Permissions Requests.
Collection Citation:
Sally K. Ride Papers, Acc. 2014-0025, National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution.
Material is subject to Smithsonian Terms of Use. Should you wish to use NASM material in any medium, please submit an Application for Permission to Reproduce NASM Material, available at Permissions Requests.
Collection Citation:
Sally K. Ride Papers, Acc. 2014-0025, National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution.
Material is subject to Smithsonian Terms of Use. Should you wish to use NASM material in any medium, please submit an Application for Permission to Reproduce NASM Material, available at Permissions Requests.
Collection Citation:
Sally K. Ride Papers, Acc. 2014-0025, National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution.
Material is subject to Smithsonian Terms of Use. Should you wish to use NASM material in any medium, please submit an Application for Permission to Reproduce NASM Material, available at Permissions Requests.
Collection Citation:
Krafft A. Ehricke Papers, Accession 2003-0025, National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution.
