Besides being in the midst of the 400+ page tome, Heirloom Vegetable Gardening, I have also been reading several other books …

A great book if you are trying to build your kitchen supplies from scratch or are trying to reduce the clutter in your kitchen.  While I regularly read non-fiction, that is not to say that I don’t occasionally read a piece of fiction, but I generally only read the classics …

Easily Faulkner’s most accessible work, The Sound and the Fury is a powerful reflection on the human consciousness and its timeless quality.  In addition to that, Faulkner’s prose is beautiful and dense.  Honestly, alongside Joyce and Conrad, I have to say that Faulkner is one of my favorite authors.

A couple of additional gardening books that I am currently reading …

and

The first book (Heirloom Vegetables: A Home Gardener’s Guide to Finding and Growing Vegetables from the Past) is an ideal beginners book.  About half of the book concerns the reasons to grow heritage vegetables and some of the details about how to find and grow them.  The last half of the book is a small selection of vegetable profiles and resources – including a very good list of seed suppliers and saver networks.  Unfortunately, when compared to the second book (Heirloom Vegetable Gardening: A Master Gardener’s Guide to Planting, Seed Saving, and Cultural History), its profiles and resources show their true limitations.  But, the little Heirloom Vegetables book would make a nice gift for a new gardener or just someone getting into those special plants.  Read more »

In that future, to which he looks forward, he will not, we apprehend, be regarded as having drawn the cosmic circle of life, but rather as having indicated one of its arcs. At all events, it seems to be a historic law that the greater portion of truths in the theory of nature first appear as purple mirages –ruddy and auroral streaks gilding the matin of man’s mind ; but the appointed time- duly brings up the perfect thought, fraught with the wealth of invisible climee, and Hooding the age with the sunlight of science.

From the New York Time’s 28 March 1860 review of The Origin of Species: On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection of the Preservation of Favored Races in the Struggle for Life.

Origin of Species Review NYT PDF

Coming to a bookstore near you soon!  Or, to pre-order, go to Amazon.

Science for the Nation is a unique look at the history of a great national institution as well as a study of the changing roles of museums and the perceived public role that a museum of science and technology plays within larger society. It illuminates the ways in which we think about the collecting and display of scientific objects, and explores the changing and often difficult relations between the state, business and industry, and museum funding. The essays also examine the Science Museum in the context of other national museums in London, and show the key differences affecting their chosen paths and individual development.

This is a great new volume … okay, I am partial because I helped to write it (see Chapter 3, entitled “The Science Museum and the Second World War”).  A perfect gift for anyone who is interested in the history of museums, especially during the 20th century.

Title Page

A Century of Hats and the Hats of the Century (click here for full-text PDF) by Edward Mott Woolley is a funny little volume published in 1923 by The Mallory Hat Company of Danbury, Connecticut.  With only 40-some pages of text, it is an interesting company history of Mallory hats from its foundation by Ezra Mallory in 1823 to its modern governance and factory methods.  In addition to the basic story, the text is illustrated with some wonderful engravings. Read more »

James A. Secord’s book, Victorian Sensation: The Extraordinary Publication, Reception, and Secret Authorship of Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation, is a marvelous work of history.  Just finished reading the whole book last night (previously, I had just dipped into sections of it for various reasons) and it is one of the best pieces of historical research that I read for awhile.  Not only does it provide a very good outline of the scientific issues of the mid-19th century, but it also successfully recovers the original meaning and purpose of a work, Vestiges, that had been forgotten.  Read more »

Blackwell Bookshop has a new history of science work for £5 off …

Patricia Fara’s A Four Thousand Year History

Patricia Fara is no Bill Bryson and so this book looks like a perfect resource for an introductory history of science course.  So, this book is definitely on my list of works to read for more reasons that just that it looks very interesting!

For a review of the book, look here or here for an interview.  Or, here is what Steven Shapin, Professor of the History of Science at Harvard has to say about it:

It’s been a very long time since any reputable historian of science had the desire, the knowledge, or the nerve to undertake a book like this– an attempt to survey the development of science from Antiquity to the present, notably including non-European materials. Patricia Fara has succeeded: Science is an elegant and compact creative synthesis of the piecemeal researches of generations of academic historians. It deserves the widest possible readership.

For those who do not live in the UK, you can get the book here … from Amazon.

They are a new publisher of history of science texts …

Classical Science Press offers two general types of publications. The first are scholarly translations of primary source material related to the history of science. These are new translations of carefully selected works, often not widely known. They are illustrated and formatted to retain their original character. When appropriate, they are combined with modern works to provide context. Classical Science Press is also proud to present new, scholarly works on specific topics related to the history of science by established scholars or innovative new works by young scholars. Our aim is to provide a venue for important work that might otherwise not appear.

They currently only have a couple of books in their catalog, but they also have a couple coming out soon.  I wish them luck in the curreny tough economic climate (which will only compound the difficulties of academic publishing that have developed over the last several years).

Just found this site last night … Bitchin Kitchen.tv

Watched some of their recipe videos and, more than anything else, they are funny! Have not tried any of the recipes, but the Garlic-Roasted Brussel Sprouts will be recommended to Jill. They also have a book out based on the website, it is $11.97 from Amazon – click the image below for more information.

This last Sunday, I added up the attendance at the Museum of the History of Science, Oxford and noticed that we had experienced a large increase in attendance, as compared to last January. So, can it be because of the failing economy that we are having more people come through the door? Well, according to statistics from the US, it seems that the economy is helping to boost people’s use of museums and libraries. Read more »