I tried cleaning out one of my e-mail inboxes recently and came upon an e-mail I received MONTHS ago, which I’d read but never answered, simply because I didn’t know the answer. It was from peacay of BibliOdyssey, who asked me way back when if I knew of any resources of (old, archived) microscopic images. I just didn’t know, because if I want to find old pictures, my source is BibliOdyssey. I’m glad to see he did end up finding the things he was looking for. Here’s a recent post full of drawn biological images from the German Natural History Museum’s Christian Gottfried Ehrenberg collection. There was a time when drawing skills were required in biology, and it wasn’t even that long ago.
If you like old images (not just scientific, but of anything, really) there’s also a BibliOdyssey book now, bringing us back full circle with images from the pre-internet age now once more on paper!
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Funnily enough, I remembered that email when I was making that (fourth) Ehrenberg post — and I promise I’m now taking you off ‘the special list’ ;- )
Ehrenberg’s legacy is both astounding and enormous (and not very well known) and I would venture to guess he’s one of the few early scientists whose complete oeuvre is available to us online. He spent his whole life just looking through a microscope and drawing every last single detail he found.
I was hoping you forgot!
What’s the “special list”? Is it “people who don’t read their e-mail at all” and I was taken off because I just confessed to having read it, OR is it “people who seem like they are really good at answering e-mail” and I was taken off because I just confessed that I was very aware of not answering?
Heh. I remember it because I felt a little embarrassed or something after writing it. It was like a reactionary swat aimed at a passing thought. I still think a dedicated site to the idea would have merit – a detailed evolution of cell microscopy sort of thing. Unless there’s one out there that has so far eluded me. So don’t worry, my lists are only ever imagined and non-replies from otherwise upstanding netizens is very low down on the totem pole for further thought.
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