A curator at the height of his powers: HW Dickinson, James Watt, and the Newcomen Society, 1919–1930

Abstract

This paper assesses the work of Henry Winram Dickinson of the Science Museum in the decade following the end of the Great War. Archival material in the Science Museum’s collections builds a detailed picture of Dickinson’s work covering the period from 1919 until 1930, during which the Newcomen Society was founded, the Science Museum’s present East Hall was opened, and highly significant acquisitions of material relating to James Watt were made. In so doing it shines a light on a peak period in the history of engineering curatorship.

Keywords:

• HW Dickinson
• James Watt
• Science Museum
• curator
• Newcomen Society

Disclosure statement

The author reports there are no competing interests to declare.

Notes

1 D. Miller, The Life and Legend of James Watt (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2019), 306.

2 J. Tann and C. MacLeod, ‘From Engineer to Scientist: Reinventing invention in the Watt and Faraday Centenaries, 1919–31’, BJHS, 40(3) (September 2007), 389. For a contrasting view of the 1931 anniversary, also see James, Frank, ‘The Janus Face of Modernity: Michael Faraday in the Twentieth Century’, British Journal for the History of Science 41 (4), (2008), 477–516.

3 Miller, 306

4 Ibid., 307.

5 D. Cannadine, ‘Engineering History, or the History of Engineering? Re-Writing the Technological Past’, Transactions of the Newcomen Society, 74(2) (2004), 163–180, 163.

6 R. Bud, ‘Collecting for the Science Museum: Constructing the Collections, the Culture and the Institution’, in P.J.T. Morris (ed), Science for the Nation: Perspectives on the History of the Science Museum (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013), 250–272, 261–262.

7 Science Museum Archive, Collection of H.W. Dickinson (Reference DCK), Person file 29, Matthew Boulton, 9 July 1909

8 Science Museum Archive, Collection of H.W. Dickinson (Reference DCK).

9 Newcomen Society Archives, James Watt Centenary celebrations and historic material/Watt pamphlet (Reference EXT08), Box 44. When this paper was written the Newcomen Society Archives were retained by the Society – they have since been transferred to the Brotherton Library at the University of Leeds.

10 Science Museum, H.W. Dickinson research box file, unregistered correspondence, ‘Transcripts of Letters, Portraits News Cuttings’, 23 June 1914.

11 Science Museum, Nominal file 1815 Pt II, ‘Watt Centenary Exhibition 1919, Photography, New Negatives of Watt Models’.

12 Newcomen Society Archives, James Watt Centenary celebrations and historic material/Watt pamphlet, (Reference EXT08), Box 44, ‘R.H. Kirton to H.W. Dickinson, 12 September 1914.

13 Newcomen Society Archives, James Watt Centenary celebrations and historic material / Watt pamphlet (Reference EXT08), Box 44.

14 H.W. Dickinson, ‘Some Unpublished Letters of James Watt’, Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, 89(1) (1915), 487–534.

15 Science Museum, H.W. Dickinson research box file, unregistered correspondence, ‘James Watt Transcripts of Letters/Portraits/News Cuttings’.

16 Science Museum, Unregistered Minutes, ‘Watt Centenary. Semi-Official Correspondence. Birmingham, signed out to Mr Dickinson, 15.3.1920’, H.W. Dickinson to W. Powell, 22 January 1919.

17 Science Museum, ‘Watt Centenary. Semi-official correspondence’, H.W. Dickinson to W. Powell, 5 Feb 1919.

18 Science Museum, ‘Watt Centenary. Semi-Official Correspondence’, R.H. Kirton to H.W. Dickinson, 12 February 1919.

19 Science Museum, ‘Watt Centenary. Semi-Official Correspondence’, E. Worthington to H.W. Dickinson, 28 March 1919.

20 Science Museum, ‘Watt Centenary. Semi-official correspondence’, Lord Weir to E. Worthington, copied to H.W. Dickinson, 28 April 1919. Perhaps surprisingly given Watt’s origins in Greenock, there is no mention in Dickinson’s correspondence of direct contact with museums in Scotland, though Lord Weir and the President of the Institution of Shipbuilders and Engineers in Scotland attended in Birmingham to ‘explain the Scottish viewpoint’.

21 Science Museum, Nominal File 1815 Pt I, ‘Watt Centenary Exhibition 1919. Birmingham Celebrations, Provisional Scheme & loan of Sun and Planet Drawings’, R.B. Asquith Ellis to H.W. Dickinson, 29 April 1919.

22 Science Museum, Nominal File 1815 Pt I, ‘Watt Centenary Exhibition 1919. Birmingham Celebrations. Provisional Scheme & loan of Sun and Planet Drawings’, H.W. Dickinson to R.B. Asquith Ellis, 1 May 1919.

23 Ibid., H.W. Dickinson to F.G. Ogilvie, 1 May 1919.

24 Nominal File 1815 Pt I: Watt Centenary Exhibition 1919, ‘Birmingham Public library Committee Presentation by ScM of photos of Watt models, loan to ScM of drawings’, H.W. Dickinson to F.G. Ogilvie, 12 May 1919.

25 Science Museum, ‘Watt Centenary. Semi-official correspondence’, H.W. Dickinson to R.B.A. Ellis, 22 May 1919

26 Ibid., H.W. Dickinson to E. Worthington, 25 June 1919.

27 Nominal File 1815 Pt I: Watt Centenary Exhibition 1919, ‘Birmingham Public library Committee Presentation by ScM of photos of Watt models, loan to ScM of drawings’, F.G. Ogilvie to W. Powell, 30 June 1919.

28 Science Museum, ‘Watt Centenary. Semi-Official Correspondence’, H.W. Dickinson to W. Powell, 30 June 1919.

29 Ibid., W. Powell to H.W. Dickinson, 3 July 1919.

30 Ibid., H.W. Dickinson to R.B.A. Ellis 13 August 1919.

31 I am sincerely grateful to John Liffen for clarifying the exhibition’s exact position for me, which I had previously thought was in the museum’s surviving East Hall. However, John pointed out that the East Hall’s then-newly constructed ground floor would only become available for use during 1923.

32 Science Museum, Catalogue of the Watt Centenary Exhibition, London, HMSO, 1919,

https://archive.org/details/catalogueofwattc00scierich/mode/2up [Accessed 8 August 2022]

33 Science Museum, Catalogue of the Watt Centenary Exhibition, 3–4.

34 Nominal File 1815 Pt II: Watt Centenary Exhibition 1919, Nominal file 1815 Pt II, ‘Watt Centenary Exhibition 1919, Institution of Mechanical Engineers, Old Drawings’, E. Worthington to F.G. Ogilvie, 13 January 1920.

35 Science Museum, Unregistered Minutes, ‘Watt Centenary. Semi-Official Correspondence. Birmingham, signed out to Mr Dickinson, 15.3.1920’, H.W. Dickinson to W. Powell, 25 August 1919.

36 A. Titley, ‘Beginnings of the Society: A Note on the Attainment of its Majority’, Transactions of the Newcomen Society, 22(1) (1941), 37.

37 Science Museum, ‘Watt Centenary. Semi-official correspondence’, H.W. Dickinson to R.H. Kirton, 21 August 1919.

38 Ibid., H.W. Dickinson to P.H. Worsley, 21 October 1919.

39 Ibid., H.W. Dickinson to R.B.A. Ellis, 25 October 1919.

40 ‘War Strain on Machinery: The Test to Destruction’, The Times Engineering Supplement, March 1919, in Science Museum Archive, Collection of Rhys Jenkins (Reference RHJ), Box 31.

41 Newcomen Society Archives, James Watt Centenary Celebrations & Historic Material / photos on file (Reference EXT08), Box 44. It should be pointed out that Chamberlain was also MP for Birmingham West which may well have been a stronger reason for his attending than being Chancellor.

42 Newcomen Society Archives, James Watt Centenary Celebrations & Historic Material (Reference EXT08), Box 44.

43 Full details are in Newcomen Society Archives, James Watt Centenary Celebrations & Historic Material (Reference EXT08), Box 44.

44 Science Museum, ‘Watt Centenary. Semi-official correspondence’, R.H. Kirton to H.W. Dickinson, 12 February 1919.

45 Ibid., W. Powell, to H.W. Dickinson, 23 Jan 1919.

46 Some are present in Science Museum, Nominal File 1814, Gibson-Watt, Major J.M., for example.

47 Science Museum, ‘Watt Centenary. Semi-official correspondence’, H.W. Dickinson to R.H. Kirton, 20 February 1919.

48 Science Museum, Unregistered Minutes: ‘Watt Centenary. Correspondence – Miss Boulton (Unregistered)’, H.W. Dickinson to C.G. Boulton, 20 June 1919. The V&A’s exhibition was a preliminary ‘retrospective’ held in advance of a major exhibition at the Royal Academy. See https://sculpture.gla.ac.uk/view/event.php?id=msib4_1268670050 [accessed 10 September 2018].

49 Science Museum, Unregistered Minutes: ‘Watt Centenary. Correspondence – Miss Boulton (Unregistered)’, O.M. Boulton to H.W. Dickinson, 14 April 1919, and R.H. Kirton to H.W. Dickinson, [no date] April 1919. Miss Boulton was a descendant of Matthew Boulton, Watt’s business partner, and still lived at Tew Park, Oxfordshire, the estate purchased by his son Matthew Robinson Boulton in 1815. Dickinson corresponded with her regarding the loan of items to the Science Museum.

50 Science Museum, ‘Watt Centenary. Semi-official correspondence’, R.H. Kirton to H.W. Dickinson, 6 May 1919.

51 Newcomen Society Archives, Memoranda regarding the foundation of the Newcomen Society; signed minutes of meetings, Newcomen Society Minute Book May 1920 to April 1922 (Reference INT01), Box 002, 19.

52 This profound question was in fact asked by one of this paper’s anonymous reviewers, to whom I offer my thanks.

53 M. Pattison, ‘Scientists, Inventors and the Military in Britain, 1915–19: The Munitions Inventions Department’, Social Studies of Science, 13(4) (1983), 521–568, 559.

54 Michael Pattison, ‘Scientists, Inventors and the Military in Britain, 1915–19: The Munitions Inventions Department’, in Social Studies of Science, 13(4) (Nov 1983), 559.

55 Science Museum, Unregistered Minutes: ‘Watt Centenary. Correspondence – Miss Boulton (Unregistered)’, H.W. Dickinson to P.M. Boulton, 23 April 1919.

56 Newcomen Society Archives, Memoranda regarding the foundation of the Newcomen Society, 19. Dickinson seems to have written the minutes, he being the secretary, and Arthur Titley checked and signed them afterwards.

57 Newcomen Society Archives, James Watt Centenary celebrations and historic material / Watt pamphlet (Reference EXT08), Box 44.

58 Newcomen Society Archives, Memoranda regarding the foundation of the Newcomen Society, 5. In the original, the ‘al’ in ‘Historical’ has been marked through.

59 Ibid., 5.

60 Ibid., 7.

61 Ibid., 19.

62 Ibid., 27.

63 Ibid., 141. At the March 2^nd meeting that year, Mr Pendred had himself submitted his own design – based on Hermes, ‘Father of all inventions’. At that time, Mr Jenkins had ‘confessed that the idea which the Society wanted to convey viz progress based on technology, was most difficult to convey pictorially; while he doubted whether anything better could be suggested to tell its own tale, yet deprecated haste in coming to a decision’. See 53. The minutes, being the formal record, would generally not note points of disagreement – more pointedly so for the Savage Club meeting already mentioned which, though it had its roots in the commemoration of Watt, ended up choosing the name Newcomen. Perhaps the ‘prolonged discussion’ Dickinson noted there, and subsequent minutes, reflect Dickinson’s professional tact and diplomacy in keeping the formal record of proceedings.

64 Newcomen Society Archives, Memoranda regarding the foundation of the Newcomen Society, 67.

65 Ibid., 79.

66 Ibid., 37.

67 Ibid., 87.

68 Science Museum collection, inv. no. 1980–1123.

69 Newcomen Society Archives, Memoranda regarding the foundation of the Newcomen Society, 121.

70 Ibid., 41.

71 See for example Science Museum Archive, Nominal File 6637, Forward, E.A.

72 Newcomen Society Archives, Memoranda regarding the foundation of the Newcomen Society, 121.

73 Ibid., 155.

74 Ibid., 114–115. E.C. Smith’s papers are at Royal Museums Greenwich: https://collections.rmg.co.uk/collections/objects/490742.html

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Ben Russell

Ben Russell has worked for the Science Museum since 1999, and been Curator of Mechanical Engineering since 2003. He wrote ‘James Watt: Making the World Anew (Reaktion 2014), edited ‘Robots’ (Scala, 2017), and was lead curator for the museum’s East Hall (2005) and Watt’s Workshop (2011) galleries, as well as temporary exhibitions ‘Cosmonauts’ (2015) and ‘Robots’ (2017–2021). Ben has recently drawn up plans to refresh the East Hall and publish an accompanying book, and is presently lead curator for a new gallery, working title ‘Engineers’, opening in early 2023.