John Benjamin Dancer (8 October 1812 – 24 November 1887) was a British scientific instrument maker and inventor of microphotography.[1] He also pioneered stereography.
Career
By 1835, he controlled his father's instrument making business in Liverpool. He was responsible for various inventions, but did not patent many of his ideas. In 1856, he invented the stereoscopic camera (GB patent 2064/1856).[2]
Dancer improved the Daniell cell by introducing the porous pot cell, which he invented in 1838.[3] He was a leading inventor and practitioner in the emerging field of microphotography, work he began shortly after the Daguerreotype process was first announced in 1839. His novel uses of microphotography, such as "the reduction of the 680-word tablet erected in memory of the electrician William Sturgeon to a positive one-sixteenth of an inch in diameter", attracted much public attention.[4] He assisted the physicist James Prescott Joule with the development of scientific instruments such as an apparatus for measuring the internal capacity of the bore of thermometer tubes, a tangent galvanometer, and other devices useful in Joule's research.[5] A substantial collection of Dancer's papers, photographs, and apparatus is held by the Ransom Center at the University of Texas.
John Benjamin Dancer's 1842 daguerreotype of Manchester from the roof of the Royal Exchange
In 1842 Dancer took a daguerreotype from the top of the Royal Exchange which is the earliest known photograph showing part of Manchester.[6]
Personal life
He died in November 1887 at the age of 75 and was buried at Brooklands Cemetery, plot D.2244, Sale, Greater Manchester. He had two daughters, Elizabeth Eleanor and Anna Maria.[7]
References
^Hallett, Michael (July–September 1986). Henisch, Heinz (ed.). "John Benjamin Dancer 1812–1887: a perspective". History of Photography, an International Quarterly. 10 (3). Taylor & Francis Ltd.: 237–255. doi:10.1080/03087298.1986.10443115. ISSN0308-7298.
^Alexander Watt, Arnold Philip, Electroplating and Electrorefining of Metals, pp.91–92, Watchmaker Publishing, 2005 ISBN1-929148-45-3 (originally published 1889).
^Solbert, Oscar N.; Newhall, Beaumont; Card, James G., eds. (November 1952). "John Benjamin Dancer (1812-1887)"(PDF). Image, Journal of Photography of George Eastman House. 1 (8). Rochester, N.Y.: International Museum of Photography at George Eastman House Inc.: 2. Archived from the original(PDF) on 9 September 2015. Retrieved 26 June 2014.
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