Old LUNAR Society

The Lunar Society was a remarkable grouping of friends who met every month in and around Birmingham on the night of the full moon (when there was most light to travel home by) from 1765 until 1813. To begin with, they called themselves the Lunar Circle, the more formal title 'Lunar Society' being adopted in 1775.

It has been written that 'The Lunar Society was second only to the Royal Society in its importance as a gathering place for scientists, inventors and natural philosophers during the second half of the eighteenth century'. In fact, it was more than that. These men were interested not merely in science, but especially in the application of science to manufacturing, mining, transportation, education, medicine and much else. They were, if you like, the revolutionary committee of that most far reaching of all the eighteenth century revolutions, the Industrial Revolution. Supremely confident, they were changing the world forever, and they knew it. They firmly believed that what they were doing would better the lot of mankind. They believed, as Jacob Bronowski put it, that 'the good life is more than material decency, but the good life must be based on material decency'. They believed that by raising productive capacity they would be able to deliver material decency for all, and to a large extent they have been proven right.

Although the Lunar Society was not a political body, for the most part its members were politically liberal, in a very 'New Labour' kind of way. Many of them sympathised with the ends, if not all of the means, of the French Revolution and the American rebellion. They were humane, and sincere in wishing to improve the lot of ordinary people. They abhorred slavery and tyranny. But they believed in private property, in capitalist self-help and entrepreneurialism. They also enjoyed themselves; it is clear from their correspondence that their meetings were fun, as well as being intellectually stimulating, and they cheerfully referred to themselves as 'lunaticks'.

So who were they, this remarkable bunch of men? They numbered fourteen, as follows.

	Matthew Boulton, who having built up the most famous manufacturing business of the day, went on to make a practical reality of James Watt's condensing steam engine, and then to invent modern, high quality, fraud resistant coinage.
	Erasmus Darwin. Grandfather of Charles, a family doctor whose work in botany and evolution anticipated much of what his grandson would write fifty years later. He was also an acclaimed poet and an inventor.
	Thomas Day, educational reformer.
	Richard Lovell Edgeworth. Also interested in educational reform, he was a pioneer of telegraphy who furthermore made discoveries in the field of electricity and invented improved agricultural machinery and a steam carriage
	Samuel Galton, a Quaker gunmaker with interests in science, who was disowned by the Society of Friends 'for fabricating and selling the instruments of war'.
	Robert Augustus Johnson, chemist.
	James Keir, who made advances in the manufacture of glass, was a pioneer of the chemical industry and made a fortune as a soap menufacturer.
	Joseph Priestley, a minister of religion and amateur scientist who discovered oxygen, the indiarubber eraser and much else, and invented carbonated water.
	William Murdock, inventor of gas lighting.
	William Small, doctor of medicine who had taught mathematics to the young Thomas Jefferson and who had interests in engineering, chemistry and metallurgy.
	Jonathan Stokes, botanist.
	James Watt, inventor of the condensing and rotary steam engines, an early copying process and much else; maker of musical and scientific instruments, canal surveyor and more.
	Josiah Wedgwood, celebrated potter, canal promoter and Charles Darwin's other grandfather.
	John Whitehurst, maker of clocks and scientific instruments, and a pioneering geologist who did much to work out how the earth had been formed.
	William Withering, another medical doctor, also a botanist with interests in metallurgy and chemistry. He is most famous for the discovery of the medicinal properties of the foxglove in treating heart disease, and took the place of William Small following the latter's untimely death in 1775.
	The American statesman Benjamin Franklin was a corresponding member of the society, as were others including John Smeaton, the great civil engineer.

They held their meetings in one another's houses, often meeting at Matthew Boulton's home, Soho House, which is not far from the Jewellery Quarter and is open to the public. You can visit there the very room in which the Lunar Society met. They demonstrated scientific discoveries, discussed how those discoveries could be translated into new products or industries, described practical problems they had encountered in their everyday activities and devised plans of action for solving them. They were much concerned, for example, with devising accurate means of measurement: accurate weights and measures were vital in assaying, whilst accurate measurements of furnace temperatures were of key importance to various manufacturing members of the group. The improvement of transport, particularly by the building of canals, concerned them and many of them invested in canal companies. But Priestley, for example, in his experiments did science for science's sake, and they were interested in that, too. And science was only the half of it. They discussed social, political and economic matters, and conducted wide-ranging debate about the social impact of the Industrial Revolution and the general revolutionary climate of the times. In a letter of apology written to Matthew Boulton, Erasmus Darwin gives a vivid flavour of their discussions:

'I am sorry the infernal Divinities, who visit mankind with diseases & are therefore at perpetual war with doctors, should have prevented my seeing all you great men at Soho today - Lord! What inventions, what wit, what rhetoric, metaphysical, mechanical & pyrotechnical will be on the wing, bandy'd like a shuttlecock from one to another of your troop of philosophers! While poor I, I by myself I, imprison'd in a post chaise, am joggled & jostled & bump'd & bruised along the King's high road, to make war on a pox or a fever!'

Why did all these distinguished people gather in Birmingham? Well, although chance played its part, you have to remember that Brum was leading the world in those days. The Soho Manufactory and the Soho Foundry were, if you like, the Silicon Valley of those times, and they drew people from all over the world, most to look, but some to live, just as Silicon Valley does today.

The Lunar Society was formally wound up in 1813, by which time only James Keir, James Watt, Edgeworth and Samuel Galton were still alive. They held a lottery to decide who should have their books, which Samuel Galton won. The youngest of the group, he survived until 1832. The rest were all gone by 1820.