Titchener's Photo Album - continued...

Many early makers of psychological instruments were employed by psychology departments or institutes to make instruments for the laboratory. When these attracted attention outside the institute the maker would often be approached to make copies of the instruments for sale. This sometimes created a cottage industry that the instrument maker (often poorly paid by universities) provided with a source of extra income.

A letter from J.D. Brown of Camden, New Jersey to E. B. Titchener, October 31, 1895 (detail, left) and a photograph of a One Meter Wheel Tachistoscope made for J. McK. Cattell and from his design.

Sometimes their "catalogues" were letters, handwritten or reproduced by early duplication techniques. These and other instrument makers just getting established could not afford the cost of engravings and merely printed price lists with descriptions but without illustrations. If the prospective customer were interested, photographs would be supplied, sometimes with more detailed descriptions and sometimes with diagrams.