Science Notebook with content on Geometry, Chemistry, Physiology, and Geography

New England, 1880. Quarter roan over pebbled boards ruled in gilt. All edges marbled. Measuring 200 x 165mm and containing 81 pages in a single hand. Several sections have been neatly excised from the notebook -- likely unrelated school content from other classes, to ensure that the present notebook focused on math and science lessons. We've been unable to pin down precisely which Annie J. Doran this manuscript was owned by (a number of Irish immigrants and first generation women by this name resided in Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and New York during this period, according to Census records); however, in the absence of a specific creator, the notebook nevertheless sheds light onto the American educational system, and the type of STEM training being provided to young women in the lead up to the nineteenth century.

The neatness of the present notebook suggests that it was not used in the classroom but, rather, was a fair copy created by Annie for study purposes. Clearly written and organized, she provides headers on the content as well as meticulous mathematical figures, formulas, and scientific tables and diagrams documenting experiments. The chemistry content is the largest section of the notebook, in fact. And it does provide step by step information on hands-on experimentation to help students understand such concepts as heat transfer and conduction, the weight of gasses, and the creation and use of combustion. Further research could be done, for example, to determine what texts Annie's instructors were using in their teaching; for several of the experiments, the diagrams and content seem similar to Jane Marcet's recommended experiments in Conversations on Chemistry, although certainly a range of texts could have been used as sources.