1222 replies to this topic

[greju]

I am kinda surprised no one noticed this on my mirror pictured. I have not seen it before and am wondering if it may have any significance or if anyone elses is inscribed like it. It is inscribed " A Cave Mirror ". The handwritting style is the same as Lews re-coated mirror from 1959 and I am pretty sure it is Tom Cave Jr doing the inscribing. Could " A Cave Mirror " have anything at all with Tom Cave Jr. personaly figuring this mirror? So many questions and so little info!

[Lew Chilton]

Greju,

I don't think anyone could see the picture of the back of your mirror well enough to notice what you just mentioned above about the "A Cave Mirror" inscription.

I took your image and played around with it a little in Photoshop Elements to try and bring out the Cave signature, and you're right - it looks almost identical to the Cave inscription on the back of my 1959 mirror. What was the date on yours, October 1964?

I don't imagine it would be too difficult to locate a specimen of Tom Cave's signature inasmuch as he was in business for about 25 years and probably wrote hundreds of business letters to customers over that period.

I would check with ALPO, the BAA, ASP and other astronomical organizations that Tom belonged to who might have his correspondence in their archives. Maybe Sky & Tel does too. Just a thought.

Attached Thumbnails

• 

[greju]

Thanks Lew, Oct. 1961. I have been looking for Tom Caves handwritting and as of yet have not found anything. Anyone?

[PiSigma]

Actually Lew, I have Tom Cave's signature on a couple dozen letters related to my 10" Custom Super Deluxe and another Cave scope. Problem is - I don't think any of them were written by Tom Cave. As came up in a previous thread, it appears that secretaries signed all of these letters. All of the letters I have were signed by five different secretaries. Their initials are at the bottom of these letters as was common when a secretary signed for an executive. The initials were bd, mb, cg, cc and cmr. The signatures match between letters with the same secretary's initials but not between letters with different secretary's initials. It would be interesting to see what Tom Cave's real signature looked like.

Attached Thumbnails

• 

[PiSigma]

I am kinda surprised no one noticed this on my mirror pictured. I have not seen it before and am wondering if it may have any significance or if anyone elses is inscribed like it. It is inscribed " A Cave Mirror ". The handwritting style is the same as Lews re-coated mirror from 1959 and I am pretty sure it is Tom Cave Jr doing the inscribing. Could " A Cave Mirror " have anything at all with Tom Cave Jr. personaly figuring this mirror? So many questions and so little info!

I did a little more research, looking at the pictures I have on file of these early mirrors, which were all engraved on the back. I'm not an expert at handwriting analysis but here's what is on these mirrors and my take on the similarities of the engraving style, giving similar styles the same Type number:

M74 – Made by Cave Optical Co. Long Beach, Cal (Type 1)
M213 – Cave Optical Co. (Type 1)
M458 – A Cave Mirror (Type 2)
M654 – Cave Optical Co. (Type 2)
R1589 – Refigured by Cave Optical Co. (Type 3)
M2004 – A Cave Mirror (Type 3)

I agree Gregg, I think yours and Lew's were engraved by the same person. But I think the person who engraved M74 and M213 was different than the person who engraved M458 and M654, and this person was also different than the person who engraved yours and Lew's.

M458 also has "A Cave Mirror" on the back. I had this originally listed as M456 but just noticed it is actually M458. I'll correct this in the first posted update of the registry.

[Datapanic]

Not only do we need an original Tom Cave Jr. signature, but also an Alika Herring signature!

[tim53]

And an Ed Beck signature, and a few other opticians I can't remember that Ed told me about several years ago.

-Tim.

[greju]

IIRC it has been said in a couple of different places Cave Sr. signed all the mirrors untill shortly before his passing in 1959. How this fits into all this I am not sure. And since only some mirrors are inscribed " A Cave Mirror " it must have some significance, I wish I knew what it was! I am also sure I read somewhere that Alika Herring used three specific letters of his name to sign his mirrors?

[PiSigma]

I finally got around to reading the S&T article – boy, I wish all of the former Cave employees would write something like that. What an excellent story.

Mr. Norton mentions that Alika Herring started in 1953, left in 1960 and came back in 1969. Mr. Norton also left in 1960 and writes that Cave then hired Ed Beck, Bob Crawford and Walt Depampalis.

Some other interesting mirror related tidbits:

Norton quotes 53,000 mirrors and 15,600 complete telescopes. Since he left in 1960 and the article is based on conversations he had with Tom Cave Jr. “last summer” (1993?) I would assume he got these numbers from Tom Cave Jr. Norton wrote that during his career at Cave from 1952 to 1960 he personally made over 600 mirrors. Since the registry confirms the serialization of 16,000-17,000 mirrors, presumably for complete scopes, (we need to fill in the gap between 10/1961 and 6/18/1965 to pin this down) Cave must not have marked the 53,000 mirrors.

Prior to the start of Cave-Wilkinson Optical Co. in December 1950 (soon to become just Cave Optical Co.), Tom Cave Sr. and Jr. made nearly 500 mirrors from 1947 to 1950. I wonder if any inscriptions identify these pre-Cave Optical Co. mirrors?

Norton writes that Tom Cave Sr. ran the business affairs of Cave Optical (implying that he didn’t make mirrors) and, prior to his death in 1957, he scribed the Cave Optical signature in the back of a thousand mirrors in an Old English script style. And, in a humorous story, one was engraved on the front!

[greju]

An interesting tidbit from one of our own.

"Thomas R. Cave Jr. personally engraved each mirror after
final figuring was completed with a diamond pencil marker, a
tradition started by his father. True Cave Optical Co. mirrors
(yes, there are clever copies) are signed on either the side or
back in freehand Old English script with the company's name,
the focal length and ratio, a serial number starting with the
letter “M,” and the date of completion. The co-author’s
Model “A” Deluxe Newtonian has a 6-inch mirror that is
etched “Cave Optical Co., 47 15/16" F.L., F/8, #M672968,
Oct. 23, 1967.”"

[clintwhitman]

Here is my 1965 10" F8 I think Tom JR Signed it. Looks like his hand.

Attached Thumbnails

• 

[clintwhitman]

New mirror #1 6" F4 WFT M705556 23 7/8" FL Aug 1970 Presently just a mirror I found a few years ago.
Photo 1

Attached Thumbnails

• 

[clintwhitman]

#1 6" F4 WFT M705556 23 7/8" FL Aug 1970 Presently just a mirror I found a few years ago.
Photo 2

Attached Thumbnails

• 

[clintwhitman]

New mirror #2 8" F8 M693959 65 1/4" FL JAN 21st 1969 (Summer of Love Baby) Presently just a mirror I found a few years ago.
Photo 1

Attached Thumbnails

• 

[clintwhitman]

#2 8" F8 M693959 65 1/4" FL JAN 21st 1969 (Summer of Love Baby) Presently just a mirror I found a few years ago.
Photo 2
Not the same hand signed these But they both came out of Cave optical, The original owner picked them up there.
(aveman

Attached Thumbnails

• 

[greju]

Tom Cave Jr. signature. Best I could do with my very limited software.

Attached Thumbnails

• 

[Dean Norris]

Here's a reply I received from Cave back when I wanted to add rotating rings to my scope. As it turned out I waited to long to purchase and ended up buying rings from Metro Machining.

Hope this helps.

Dean

Attached Thumbnails

• 

[Dean Norris]

Close up of the signature.

Dean

Attached Thumbnails

• 

[greju]

Almost surely not Caves signature. Bottom most notation confirms this. As has been said many times before Caves secretary most likely signed his correspondence.

"IDENTIFYING INITIALS: When someone other than the author types and finalizes a letter, it is customary to include a line indicating who performed this work. Show the initials of the writer of the letter in capital letters, followed by either a colon or forward-slash and the assistant's initials in lower case letters. For example, RFH:sjs or RFH/sjs."

[Lew Chilton]

Greju,

Is it possible that the secretary typed the letter and Tom Cave signed it - at least in some cases?

Tom Cave wrote many articles and made many planetary drawings of Mars, Saturn and Jupiter for the Strolling Astronomer, the publication of the Association of Lunar and Planetary Observers (ALPO). (You can go to their website.)

:thinking:I'll bet someone has the back issues (like Jack Eastman) who could look for articles and drawings by TRC with his signature. Just a thought.

[tim53]

Dean and others:

Did anyone notice that the script in the signature that Dean posted is similar to the Cave logo? Particularly the capitol C, but even the rest of the word "cave" looks similar.

-Tim.

[greju]

Lew, sure it is possible but the notation at the bottom of the letter usually signifies someone other than the signee actually composed and signed the letter. As far as a signature accompanying his drawings, that is what I posted.

[doublestar]

This signature was done on the bottom of a customer supplied form that requested Cave to reply as to status of order and sign. I don't know for sure that it is Cave's signature, but there is no secretary initials on this one, even though they could have been added since the response was typed.

I have a few other letters, but like others above, have the secretary initials.

Attached Thumbnails

• 

[greju]

Tim, could you post a picture of what logo you are referring to? This is the one I have.

Attached Thumbnails

• 

[PiSigma]

Gregg - is that 'tidbit' from John S.? I don't have that mirror in the registry.

At the end of it all maybe this doesn't really matter. I think the penmanship of someone scribing a mirror with a diamond engraver is probably going to look a bit different than that same person writing on a sheet of paper with a pen. I hope we can figure out which mirrors were signed/made by Tom Cave Jr. and others and this might be a factor to consider.

On the block lettered mirrors who knows? Unless someone who was there at the time says "this is my engraving" or "this is how so-and-so engraved them" we will probably never know.

I did a little different processing on that Tom Cave Jr. signature from the Mars drawings. Maybe this is a little better.

Attached Thumbnails

•