William Wales (optician)

William Wales (c. 1838 – September 15, 1907) was an English-American optical instrument inventor specializing in the manufacture of objectives for use in microscopes. Wales's objective inventions were used frequently in contemporary microscopes and many examples survive in private and museum collections today.

Wales was first employed with the London-based optics firm Smith & Beck. There, he ground lenses for use in microscopes.^[1] He immigrated to the United States from England in 1862, settling in Fort Lee, New Jersey, and quickly opened his own business manufacturing objectives.^[2] In 1864, Wales entered a partnership with W. H. Bulloch under the name William Wales & Co., although this dissolved in 1866 when Bulloch moved to Chicago.^[3]

Although he did not manufacture microscopes as a whole device,^[4] Wales's optics were used frequently in microscopes sold across the United States.^[5] Wales assisted with John Leonard Riddell's invention of the monobjective binocular microscope, constructing the objective in such a way that it could illuminate itself rather than needing to be separately lit.^[6]

On February 21, 1865, Wales filed an application for a patent on a microscope. This invention used two or more oblique lenses that could allow natural light to pass through; previous microscopes had to be manually shifted to accommodate lighting.^[7]

Wales was also involved in the Grand Lodge of Good Templars and was elected to their New Jersey board in 1878.^[8]

On October 18, 1889, he was elected President of the New-York Microscopical Society pro tempore^[9] and continued to be on its committee on admissions between 1889 and 1891.^[10]

On September 13, 1907, Wales and his family returned home to Leonia, New Jersey, after a trip to Europe. That night, Wales attempted suicide by cutting his wrist and throat and was discovered by his wife. He was transported to the hospital in Englewood, where he died of his injuries on the afternoon of September 15. The New York Times cited "insane jealousy" over his wife as his motive, although Wales himself did not provide a reason before his death.^[11] Wales was survived by his second wife and four children.^[11]

Contemporary microscopists regarded Wales's objectives as exemplary.^[1][12] One early edition of The American Naturalist described his inventions, "With no equal power of Powell & Leland's of London, of Hartnack of Paris, of Tolles & Grunow of this country, or of Gundlach of Vienna, various objectives of each and all of which makers I have examined, have either, I myself, or other microscopists of my acquaintance been able to effect this".^[13]

Microscopes that include objectives supplied by Wales are in collections at various institutions, including Harvard University,^[14] East Carolina University,^[15] and the United States Army Medical Museum.^[16]

• Wales, William (1885). "The Proper Care and Use of Microscope Lenses". Journal of the New-York Microscopical Society. 1 (5). New-York Microscopical Society: 113–116. Retrieved April 13, 2024 – via Google Books.
• Wales, William (1892). "C. A. Spencer's Use of Fluorite in 1891". Journal of the New York Microscopical Society. 8 (20). New York Microscopical Society.

• Warner, Deborah Jean (1996). "William Wales: An Anglo-American Microscope Maker". Rittenhouse. 10 (40): 121–126.