Research Fellows

Alexi Baker

Research Associate, 'The Board of Longitude 1714–1828: Science, Innovation and Empire in the Georgian World'

Research interests: All aspects of early modern history and material culture, most recently the instrument makers and sellers of early eighteenth-century London, and the origins and early history of the Board of Longitude.

I am currently reworking my doctoral thesis – '"This Ingenious Business": the socio-economics of the scientific instrument trade in London, 1700–1750' – for publication as a book.

I also have a Master's degree in Science & Environmental Reporting and write popular articles and multimedia scripts on modern and historical science and related subjects.

Recent academic publications

• 'The business of life: the socioeconomics of the "scientific" instrument trade in early modern London', in F-E. Eliassen & K. Szende (eds.), Generations in Towns: Succession and Success in Pre-Industrial Urban Societies (Newcastle upon Tyne, UK, 2009), 169–191.
• 'Reading between the lines: the instrument trade in the newspapers of 18th-century London', Scientific Instrument Society Bulletin, no. 102 (2009), 12–17.
• 'The London instrument trade, from Culpeper to Cole', in B. Grob & H. Hooijmaijers (eds.), Who needs scientific instruments? (Leiden, The Netherlands, 2006), 99–105.