Microscope Museum

Collection of antique microscopes and other scientific instruments

 

    

Microscope 30 (F.W. Schieck; trichinen mikroskop; c. 1900)

A close up of a box

Description automatically generatedA close up of a box

Description automatically generatedA picture containing wooden, table, sitting, desk

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Friedrich Wilhelm Schieck (1790 – 1870; also, at times, spelled Schiek) was the first member of his family to produce scientific instruments. After serving an apprenticeship, he moved to Berlin where he worked with Carl Philipp Heinrich Pistor (1778 - 1847). By 1824, he was a full partner with Pistor. At that time, instruments were signed Pistor & Schiek. By 1837, the partners separated and Schiek began to produce instruments under his own name; the microscopes were usually marked “Schiek in Berlin”. Beginning around 1860, the father began to work with his son, Friedrich Wilhelm Hermann Schieck, who by 1865 assumed full management of the firm under the name F. W. Schieck Optisches Institut. The elder Schieck died in 1870. The son died in 1916, but the firm continued well into the 20th century. F.W. Schiek produced high quality research microscopes until 1865, when the business was taken over by his son. Once the younger 'Schieck' took over he changed the focus of the firm to higher volume and more basic microscopes. Like several other German makers of the time, he especially sold microscopes for meat inspection (trichinoscopes). Microscope 30 is portable trichinoscope dated to c. 1900. The inside of the wooden box is signed as ‘F.W. Schieck, Optisches Institut, Berlin S.W. 46’. This microscope mounts atop its wood case and is equipped with an extra-large rectangular stage plate that accommodate a large dual plate glass compressorium for the examination of pork (unfortunately broken in this piece). During the meat inspection process, thinly cut samples of pork dissected from meat samples being inspected would be placed between the glass plates and compressed resulting in transparent specimens that could be examined microscopically for the presence of Trichinella cysts using this instrument.

References

F. W. SCHEICK MICROSCOPE (http://www.microscope-antiques.com/schieck.html), last accessed on 13.08.2020

F. W. Schieck Berlin S.W. No. 7903, c. 1884 Continental style microscope (http://www.antique-microscopes.com/photos/FW_Schieck.htm), last accessed on 13.08.2020

Schiek in Berlin, medium microscope, ~1855 (https://www.microscopehistory.com/schieck-in-berlin), last accessed on 13.08.2020

 

LAST EDITED: 15.08.2020