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Microscope Museum Collection of antique microscopes and other
scientific instruments |
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Microscope
506 (WR Prior;
inverted microscope; 1960s)
WR Prior & Co Ltd was founded by Walter Robert Prior in
1919. The company was originally located at Eagle Street, Holborn, London and
later at Devonshire Street, London. Little is known about the Company during
this time and no records or catalogues exist as to when and why they began to
produce microscopes under the Prior name. A WR Prior catalogue of microscopes
and accessories dated 1950 gives the location of the office as Devonshire
Street and the factory as Bishop’s Stortford, Herts., England, where
manufacturing was carried out from 1942 to 1957. On 10 January 1947 Walter
Robert Prior died at the early age of 55. The company relocated to a new
factory at London Road, Bishop Stortford in 1956 and continued to produce and
develop new microscopes. By 1960, Prior and Charles Perry merged
together but kept their separate names until about 1970. In 1978 WR
Prior & Co Ltd was acquired by The Gwyndann
Group of Companies and the name of the company was changed in 1979 to that of
Prior Scientific Instruments Ltd. In 1981 Prior Scientific Instruments Ltd
merged with James Swift and Son Ltd (founded in the mid 19th
century). Fire at the Bishop Stortford factory in 1988 meant the company had
to relocate to its present site in Fulbourn,
Cambridge, England, offering precision mechanical engineering, optics, electronics and precision assembly. Expanding its
operation further the company opened a new office in 1991, Prior Scientific
Inc, based in the USA, in 2008 Prior GMBH in Jena, Germany, in 2010 Prior KK
in Tokyo, Japan and in 2018 Prior China. Microscope 506 was produced by WR
Prior and dates from the 1960s. The instrument is signed with “PRIOR” and has
the serial number 23304. The microscope has its original wooden box. This
instrument was designed for applications such as examining tissue cultures or
in fresh water and marine biology for the examination of plankton. The
instrument was provided with rack and pinion substage, monocular or binocular
microscope body and plain stage. Any suitable external light source could be
fitted, such as the daylight model with a mirror (as microscope 506) or a
detachable substage lamp (Figure 1).
Figure 1. Prior’s inverted microscope with a
substage lamp and binocular body as featured in a 1963 catalogue of the firm. |
