Sneak Peek From the Stacks: Designs for 19th Century Walking-Sticks

Design sketches for the handles of walking sticks from Sheldrake's Notebook

The Dibner Library of the History of Science and Technology has a large collection of manuscripts, including some rather odd miscellaneous items. The Practical Notebook of Thomas B. Sheldrake (fMSS 001279 B SCDIRB Dibner Library) contains handwritten notes for the construction and use of batteries and "apparatus for showing electrical phenomenon," as well as instructions for electroplating and plaster-casting. Sheldrake, a self-described working cabinet maker about whom little else is known, also collected these whimsical hand-drawn sketches of "designs for the tops of walking sticks, 1860" in his notebook.

--Diane Shaw, Special Collections Cataloger, Smithsonian Institution Libraries