CECIL E. HANSON COLLECTION
ANTIQUE SURVEYING INSTRUMENTS

AMERICAN TRANSITS

F. W. Lincoln Jr. & Company - Boston, MA, ca 1880*

Serial Number: 895
Telescope Length: 10-1/2"
Diameter of Horizontal Circle: 6-1/2"
Needle Length: 4-1/2"
Diameter of Vertical Arc: 1/2 arc, 5"
Height: 12"
Weight: 18 lb
Box:
Condition: Good
Found: October 19, 1966 - Buff&Buff Co., Boston, MA
CEH Inventory# T15

*The business was sold to C. C. Hutchinson in 1883 (see below) so instrument was likely made before then. Cecil Hanson had estimated that this transit was made around 1880, but the basis for that estimate has not been documented.

Excerpted from “Makers of Surveying Instruments of America since 1700” by Charles Smart, 1967, Vol 2, p. 227:

F. W. LINCOLN JR. & COMPANY (1839 - 1883)

Frederick Walker Lincoln, Jr. (1817 - 1898)

Frederick Walker Lincoln, Jr. was born at Boston on February 27, 1817 according to his monument in Mt. Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, Massachusetts. His grandmother was Deborah Revere, daughter of Paul Revere. When he was thirteen years old, he was apprenticed to Gedney King and his son and successor, Charles Gedney King. In 1839 Mr. Lincoln went in business for himself. He continued for forty-three years as a maker of nautical and surveying instruments. In 1883 he sold the business, F. W. Lincoln Jr. & Co., to Charles C. Hutchinson who had been a partner since 1858. He continued the business under the firm name of C. C. Hutchinson until his death in 1913. The firm was then taken over by his successors until 1940 under the same name.

In December 1857, Mr. Lincoln became Mayor of Boston. He was elected Mayor each year serving until December 1864. In 1882 he accepted the position of Manager of the Boston Storage Company, the position he held at the time of his death on 13 September 1898.

In the collection of Historical Scientific Instruments at Harvard University in Cambridge is a transit with a 10 1/2" telescope with a 4 1/2" needle. It is engraved F. W. Lincoln Jr. & Co. Boston No. 907.

The Gurley Museum has a Lincoln transit, the gift of the Buff and Buff Mfg. Co. Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts. The beveled limb is 6 1/4", 9" telescope, 3 3/4" vertical needle. It is engraved F. W. Lincoln Jr. Boston on the top plate.

Reference:
History of the Lincoln Family: An account of the Descendants ’of Samuel Lincoln of Hingham, Mass., 1637-1920. Compiled by Waldo Lincoln, A. B., President of the American Antiquarian Society, Worcester.
Commonwealth Press 1923.