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Microscope Museum Collection of antique microscopes and other
scientific instruments |
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Microscope 250 (Casartelli; folding linen tester; late 19th
century to the early 20th century)
Guiseppe Luigi Casartelli (1823 – 1900) emigrated as a child from
Italy to Liverpool, England, joining a relative’s scientific instrument firm
business. He changed his name to Joseph Louis Casartelli and later moved to
Manchester where he established himself as a manufacturer of optical
equipment, trading at 43 Market Street for many years. Around 1850,
Casartelli produced microscopes, telescopes and other optical devices. By the
1870s-80s, Casartelli’s business focussed on supplying the heavy industries
of Manchester, including fittings for steam engines, mining equipment and
optical instruments for the fabric industry. One of Casartelli’s sons, Joseph
Henry, was made a partner of the company and the business became “J.
Casartelli and Son” in 1896. Casartelli’s business moved to 18 Brown Street,
Manchester in 1922, acquired the business of another family member in
Liverpool in 1929, but was liquidated during the Great Depression in 1933.
Parts of the business continued under different ownerships, including the
Liverpool business as ‘J. Casartelli & Son (Liverpool)’ (later
‘Casartelli Instruments Ltd.’, in 1984, which closed in 1989), and the
original business became ‘J. Casartelli & Son Ltd.’ (and then ‘John
Casartelli (M/c) Ltd.’ in 1939). Microscope 250 is a folding linen tester, or
linen prover, engraved with ‘CASARTELLI, MANCHESTER’. The instrument should
be dated from the late 19th century to the early 20th century and would be
used for counting threads in fabrics (the number of threads per unit of
length provides evidence of a higher quality of cloth). These instruments
fold flat for storing and transport and form a 'C' shape when in use. The
earliest forms have a simple standard opening on the base, but later versions
have this opening marked with calibrations of some kind. These types of linen
testers have been made and sold by many companies since at least the early
19th century and were rarely signed by their makers or retailers (Figure 1).
Figure 1. Folding linen testers engraved in the
catalogues of several companies: (A) Palmer (1840); (B) Negretti and Zambra
(1859); (C, D) William McAllister (1867); (E, F) Negretti and Zambra (1870s e
1885); (G) James Queen (1870 and 1872); (H) Ernest Goldbacher (1879); (I) B.
Kahn & Son (c. 1890); (J) Bausch and Lomb (1892); (K) Arthur Thomas
(1914); (L) Bausch and Lomb (1914); (M) A. Clarkson & Co (1920s); (N)
Emille Deyrolle (1931); and (O, P, Q) Gallenkamp (c. 1939) References LINEN
TESTERS (OR LINEN PROVERS), AND THREAD-COUNTING MICROSCOPES: 19TH AND 20TH
CENTURY (c. 1840- c. 1950) (https://www.microscope-antiques.com/linen.html), last accessed on 22.01.2022 FOLDING
LINEN PROVER MICROSCOPES: 19TH AND 20TH CENTURY (https://www.microscope-antiques.com/foldingprovers.html), last accessed on 22.01.2022 PILLAR TYPE
LINEN PROVER MICROSCOPE: 19TH CENTURY (https://www.microscope-antiques.com/pillarprovers.html#neill), last accessed on 22.01.2022 Joseph Louis
Casartelli, 1823 – 1900 (http://microscopist.net/CasartelliJLC.html), last accessed on 18.03.2022 LAST
EDITED: 18.03.2022 |
