Keywords: No reserve, meteorology, Julien P. Friez, Göttingen, weather instrument, antique science, thermometer, Victorian scientific instrument, Industrial Revolution design, Late 19th century technology, Historicist craftsmanship, Belle Époque engineering, Academic era scientific tools, Heinrich Lambrecht style, Negretti & Zambra style, Rudolf Fuess style, brass and glass, dual scale dial, meteorological instrument, scientific measurement device
Summary:
Hygrometer/thermometer with a white enamel dial, marked "Lambrecht's Polymeter - Centigrade

National Museum of American History: Lambrecht’s Polymeter is a multi-purpose meteorological instrument consisting of a mercury thermometer for temperature (missing in this example) and a hair hygrometer for humidity. The inscriptions on the face of this example read "LAMBRECHT'S POLYMETER" and "JULIEN P. FRIEZ / Meteorological Instruments and Apparatus BALTIMORE (Md.) U.S.A."

Wilhelm Lambrecht (1834-1904), a mechanical, optical and meteorological instrument maker in Göttingen, designed this type of hair hygrometer around 1880. The firm remains in business, advertising as "The Weather Specialists Since 1859."

Ref: “The Polymeter” in Julien P. Friez, Catalogue of Meteorological Instruments and Apparatus (Baltimore, 1893), pp. 35-37.

National Museum of American History
Id Number:PH.314562Accession Number:204612Catalog Number:314562
Measurements: 9 1/2 x 3 1/8 in. (24.1 x 7.9 cm.)

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