III. John Peate, 1 820-1 903 



F. W. Preston and William J . McGiath, Jr. 



Although John Peate ivas born tvhen Holcotnb tvas 

 only 33, and before that pioneer telescop-maker had 

 produced his first instrument, he lived ivell into the 

 time when American telescope-making had come of age. 

 Before Peate' s death George Ellery Hale had begun his 

 career as a promoter of large telescopes; indeed, the 

 Yerkes 40-inch refractor ivas completed a year prior to 

 Peate' s delivery of his own magnum opus, a 61-inch 

 reflector, to The American University . For M years 

 the University sought funds to finance the installation 

 of this mirror, until tt finally beca??je obsolete as a 

 result of advances in the technology of glass mirror 

 making. 



In 1934 it was sent by the American University to 

 the Smithsonian Institution . About this titne Dr. 

 F. W. Preston undertook the difficult task of recon- 

 structing Peate' s career and particularly the story of 

 the great mirror. His results were published in the 

 Bulletin of the American Ceramic Society i«i936. 



With the gracious permission of Dr. Preston and 

 the Bulletin, this article has been condensed, and 

 augmented, for publication here by William J . 

 McGrath, Jr., of the United States National 

 Museum staff. 



JOHN PEATE, bricklayer, Methodist minister, and 

 amateur extraordinary in the art of telescope 

 making, was the first born of Thomas and Mary Peate.' 



He was born on May 6, 1820, in the small northern 

 Irish town of Drumskelt. When John was seven, 

 his father, a mason, emigrated to Quebec, Canada, 

 the first of several moves to cities in Canada and the 

 United States, terminating in 1836 in Buffalo, New 

 York, where the father was to spend the last seven 

 years of his life.- 



Nothing is known of the circumstances of John's 

 life during these early years, nor of his educat on. 

 In 1836, at the age of 16, he entered his father's trade 

 as an apprentice bricklayer. He worked at this 

 trade for about sixteen years, apparently intermit- 

 tently, for he seems to have been a student at Oberlin 

 College part of the time between 1842 and 1845.^ 

 In the latter year he married Mary Elizabeth Tilden 

 of Buffalo. 



Peate's career as a bricklayer ended in 1851, when 

 he became a full-time minister, having been converted 

 to his mother's religion. This came about in con- 

 sequence of his attendance, when he was about 20 

 years old, at a Methodist revival. There he was 

 "converted," and, with characteristic energy and 

 enthusiasm, plunged into his new religion. His 

 attendance at Oberlin may have been connected 

 with his preparation for the ministry. In any case, 

 he started to preach in 1849, on trial with the Metho- 

 dist Erie Conference, was ordained a deacon in 1851, 

 and an elder two years later. From this time until 

 he was made a supernumerary in 1894 he worked 

 full-time as a minister. 



The mobility which marked his early life was re- 

 peated in his ministerial career. Including his pro- 

 bationary term he held 19 different appointments 

 in 14 cities and towns in northwestern Pennsylvania, 

 northeastern Ohio, and southwestern New York. 

 He was a successful and popular minister, and is said 

 to have converted some 500 persons at one re\dval 



1 F. W. Preston, "The first big American telescope mirror, 

 John Peate, his lens," Bulletin of the American Ceramic Society, 

 1936, vol. 15, pp. 129-152. Hereafter cited as Preston. 



2 The circumstances of Peate's life and ministerial career 

 are from Preston, supplemented by Dr. Peate's service record, 

 provided by the Erie Conference of the Methodist Church. 

 Dr. Preston's prime sources are: J. N. Fradenburgh, History oj 

 the Erie Conference, Oil City, Pa., 1907, vol. 2, pp. 204-211; obit- 

 uary notice by R. N. Stubbs in Minutes oj the Erie Conference, 

 pi. publ. 1903, p. 90. Other data were obtained by Preston 

 through interviews and letters, all cited in detail in the article. 



3 From information provided by Robert Barr, acting sec- 

 retary of Oberlin College, February 15, 1960. The college 

 records show a John Peate from Buffalo enrolled in the prepar- 

 atory department in 1842-43 and 1844-45. The Encyclopedia 

 Americana (1924 ed., vol. 21, p. 460) states that Peate attended 

 Oberlin about this time. The Doctorate was an honorary one 

 conferred by Allegheny College. 



PAPER 26: THREE 19TH-CENTURY AMERICAN TELESCOPE MAKERS 

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