RARE 19th C. 1850s American Stick Barometer by F. C. D. McKAY, Warsaw, New York

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1850s american stick barometer by f. Rare american mid-19th century combination stick barometer & thermometer by f. Mckay of warsaw (later elmira) new york. Please click on thumbnails to view an enlargement. The case measures 38.5 inches long, and the brass knob on top adds about another inch.

The brass face plate is stamped f. I have read on a genealogy site that ferdinand mckay was born in 1834 in warsaw, new york, but later moved to elmira, new york, where he was a machinist and instrument maker, according to that city’s directories from the mid-1860s to 1874. According to paula rigano-murray’s excellent rootsweb entry regarding mckay:.

Electro gold and silver plating, all kinds of light jobs and model work, agent for the howe sewing machine and the new england wax thread machine, agent for a first class wooden leg, agent for roper’s new hot air or caloric engine. The barometer looks to be in good physical condition. It is a stick barometer of the mercury jar type. As you can see, the jar is empty and there is no lid.

I have no way of knowing whether the jar is original to the barometer. Also, there apparently was once a door or cover on the back of the jar compartment, but that is long gone.

Also, you can see that a small piece of molding is missing from the side of the instrument. The brass faceplate looks terrific, with the markings and maker’s information quite clear, as you can see from the images. A couple of great markings on the thermometer portion are “blood heat” and fever heat. Thermometer is intact and seems to be pretty accurate.

Regarding the date, since mckay is listed as having been born in warsaw and later moving to elmira, it seems logical to conclude that the instrument predates at least 1866, by which time he appears in the elmira city directory. Possibly late 1850s, as i have seen another mckay warsaw-era barometer identified as dating to the late 1850s.The item “RARE 19th C. 1850s American Stick Barometer by F.

McKAY, Warsaw, New York” is in sale since Sunday, September 21, 2014. This item is in the category “Antiques\Science & Medicine (Pre-1930)\Scientific Instruments\Barometers”. The seller is “guzzi1969″ and is located in Wisconsin – The Badger State. This item can be shipped to United States.

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