Scientific American, Vol. 40, No. 8 (1879)
Scientific American, volume 40, number 8, is a weekly American periodical of 1879 that reported inventions, machinery and science for a general readership of engineers, mechanics and inventors. The pictures are black-and-white line engravings of patent-style mechanical drawings: a sliding gauge with lettered Fig. 1 to Fig. 3 views, a walking cultivator with a large spoked wheel, a close-up of a gear-toothed coupling, and an electrical apparatus with coils, a battery jar and a cylinder. A designer might draw on their crisp hatching, labelled callouts and precise technical line work for vintage engineering motifs.
