large enough for a mirror of this size.^* They quot- 

 ed a price of 118,000 — more, obviously, than he could 

 afford. He then canvassed the glassmakers of Pitts- 

 burgh, the center of American glassmaking. How- 

 ever, the Pittsburgh firm.s had little experience in 

 optical glass, especially of this size, and none would 

 consider making the blank. 



Having been rebuffed in Pittsburgh, he approached 

 the Standard Plate Glass Company of Butler, Penn- 

 sylvania. Plate glass making, at least profitable plate 

 glass making, was new in America and the Standard 

 was one of the newer companies. Moreover, it was 

 reputed one of the best plate glass makers in the coun- 

 try. Peate wrote to H. C. Tilton, general manager 

 of the plant, asking him for a disc of glass without 

 bubble or flaw 62 inches in diameter and 7 inches 

 thick. He further advised him that he would see him 

 in a few days. Tilton's experience and that of his 

 top supervisors was limited to the business of making 

 ordinary plate glass. Therefore, he sought advice as 

 to the feasibility of this fantastic project. He con- 

 sulted George Howard, maintenance engineer of the 

 plant, who had graduated from Cornell only a year 

 before. George Howard, later to become noted as an 

 inventor of glassmaking machinery, was at this time 

 simply an optimistic young engineer. 



"Howard, here's a man at Greenville who wants us 

 to cast him a disc 62 inches in diameter and 7 inches 

 ' thick. Is that possible?" 



Howard calculated the cubical contents of the pro- 

 posed disc and replied that it was just barely possible. 

 He didn't see any particular difficulty in it. He 

 thought the first few attempts might fail but felt that 

 they could cast it successfully. Howard was later to 

 ascribe his success more to his optimism and ignorance, 

 rather than to any particular innovation he made. 

 After being reassured by Howard, Tilton continued 

 "Well, this Dr. Peate is coming down here tomorrow 

 and he wants a quotation. How much do you think 

 we ought to ask?" 



"We'll have some special apparatus to make and 

 some experimenting to do. Then we'll probably 

 lose two or three pots of glass. I think you'd better 

 ask him $800." Howard thought that this was 



" Preston has reconstructed the story of the making of the 

 62-inch mirror from contemporary journals, which will be 

 cited below, and from personal communications with some of 

 the participants, notably George Howard and George Lambert. 

 Detailed citation of these communications are given in Preston. 

 He has also used a brief manuscript account by Peate him- 

 self (Preston, p. 142, n. 62). 



plenty. Tilton, however, was more cautious and 

 doubled the price. Peate arrived in Butler on 

 schedule. When Tilton named his price, Peate, of 

 course, agreed instantly. Tilton was somewhat 

 shocked and probably would have been more so had 

 he known what St. Goubain had asked. At any rate 

 the contract was placed with Standard, apparently 

 in October 1894. 



Having obtained a maker for his disc Peate im- 

 mediately began making arrangements to prepare 

 the disc. He contracted with the machine shop of a 

 John Hodge for the tools with which the mirror would 

 be worked. This small firm. The Hodge Manu- 

 facturing Co., employed only four men besides the 

 owner. Among these was Frank A'Hearn, then just 

 a boy, who became the prime source for details of the 

 tools used by Peate in this work. Starting in Novem- 

 ber 1894 notes such as, "worked for Dr. Peate 3}^ 

 hours" begin to appear in his workbook. '^ 



The Hodge company made several (probably 

 three) grinding tools for Peate. One was about 12 

 inches in diameter, and was to be used by hand. 

 Two of the larger tools were provided with the male 

 member of a ball and socket joint and were to be 



15 Communication with Frank A'Hearn and John Hodge. 

 Preston, p. 135. 



Grinding fool for lens , , - ~ J 



Buggy. 



-Pulley 



■<-Belt. ■ 



Radius arm 



, Grinding wheel 

 '^--Pulley 



Figure 12. — Hodge's method of cutting the checker 

 grooves. (From Preston, fig. 6.) 



174 



BULLETIN 228: CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE MUSEUM OF HISTORY AND TECHNOLOGY 



