A vintage microscope by Cooke Troughton & Simms with the reference 202101 and dates from the early 1950's. The microscope carries the 'WD' broad arrow mark in two places, for 'War Department', thus military issue.
Cooke, Troughton & Simms was a British instrument-making firm formed in York in 1922 by the merger of T. Cooke & Sons and Troughton & Simms. Thomas Cooke set up a business in York in 1837 making astronomical telescopes. One early notable instrument was a 4.5 inch equatorial refractor which would have been exceptional at the time. In 1851 Cooke built a 7.25 inch equatorial telescope. Cooke made the optical elements himself for both these instruments. Thomas Cooke built a reputation for high quality optics and, as well as smaller instruments, supplied large instruments to observatories around the world.
 
From the outset in 1826 and earlier Troughton and Simms of London excelled in the high precision work of dividing circles and so provided many observatories with large transit instruments and supplied national surveys such as the Ordnance Survey, with large transit theodolites.
 
The Microscope stands 36cm (14.17") high and weighs 6.3kg (13.89lbs).
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