I just joined this forum and I am a microbiology lecturer. in the UK. This may explain why I like microscopes and microscopy!
Beyond my microbiology professional activity, I also started collecting microscopes some years ago, as an hobby, and maintain a (quite nerd...) webpage about this stuff (can have a look here: www.microscopemuseum.uk), and sometimes also organise some outreach events (like school seminars, small exhibitions at the university where I work, etc.).
This may give some context for the topic I am looking for information about, and maybe some members of this nice forum may help
Very recently, someone donated me several microscopes made by Prior, and also by Charles Perry. I cannot find much information about the microscopes these makers produced (before the 1980s), and I am in a quest to try to find some kind of table in which we can associate their microscope serial numbers to the respective years of manufacture (information that can be found, for example, on the warranty labels glued on the wooden boxes of many of these instruments).
The associations I currently now are the following (serial number - year):
For Prior:
6495 - 1936
6621 - 1937
6889 - 1938
7191 - 1939
7196 - 1939
10723 - 1948
14392 - 1951
14669 - 1951
For Charles Perry:
4403 - 1930
If possible, if some member has any microscopes from Prior and/or Charles Perry, and the information about its serial numbers vs. year of manufacture, I would be delighted to know about that.
And of course, happy to start participating in interesting discussions around here
Many thanks,
Joao