+ − Am Hist R 26:146 O ’20 360w
“The chapters on The background, The revolt of the common man, and Industrial development may, perhaps, be found to contain more that is new than any of the others. The second mentioned, which describes the wresting of political control from the Confederate soldier, is probably the best in the book. All are good, however.” M. J. White
+ Mississippi Valley Hist R 7:159 S ’20 500w + N Y Times p16 O 31 ’20 130w R of Rs 62:110 Jl ’20 80w
THOMPSON, MRS JANE SMEAL (HENDERSON), and THOMPSON, HELEN GERTRUDE. Silvanus Phillips Thompson, his life and letters. il *$7.50 Dutton
(Eng ed 20–11520)
“Many old students of the Finsbury technical college will welcome the life of its first principal, which has been compiled by his wife and daughter. Thompson accepted that post in 1885 and occupied it until his death in 1916. In addition to his life-work at Finsbury, Thompson wrote one of the best of elementary textbooks on electricity and magnetism, a standard work on dynamo-electric machinery, lives of Faraday and Lord Kelvin, and various monographs connected with Gilbert and the early history of magnetism, besides other books and a number of scientific papers. He was a convinced member of the Society of Friends, and frequently spoke at the Westminster meeting and elsewhere. Some of his religious addresses were printed in a posthumous work, ‘A not impossible religion.’—Spec
“These ladies enable us to make a closer acquaintance with one, to whose lucid explanations from the platform we have listened with pleasure, and whose text-books we have read with profit. The references to his home life are restrained but interesting. But we could have wished that letters other than those dealing with scientific matters were more plentiful.”
+ − N Y P L New Tech Bks p66 Jl ’20 180w (Reprinted from Engineering Ag 6 ’20)
“His biography is interesting and it is also stimulating.”