Duboscq, Jules

Region: France    Period: 1850–1890    Occupation: Inventor / Instrument maker   Tag: Duboscq Louis Jules Duboscq
* 5 March 1817, Villaines-sous-Bois, France   † 24 September 1886, Paris, France

Jules Duboscq was apprenticed in 1834 to the Parisian optician Jean-Baptiste François Soleil. In 1849 Duboscq took over Soleil’s instrument workshop. The business continued under the name Duboscq-Soleil, as a tribute to his mentor, who had by then also become his father-in-law.

In 1850 Duboscq met David Brewster, who demonstrated his lenticular stereoscope. Brewster had not found manufacturers in the United Kingdom willing to produce the device. Duboscq, however, immediately recognised its commercial potential and began manufacturing viewers now known as the Brewster-type stereoscope. Duboscq commissioned his photographer Claude-Marie Ferrier to produce stereo daguerreotypes, which were subsequently issued by Duboscq.

According to Duboscq, he encountered the glass magic lantern slides of William Langenheim and Frederick Langenheim at the Great Exhibition in London. This inspired him to produce glass stereoviews. The development marked the beginning of glass stereoview production, which would later become a particular French speciality. Duboscq modified the Brewster-type stereoscope by adding a ground glass at the rear so that glass stereoviews could be illuminated by transmitted light.

Duboscq registered his designs in 1852 in a detailed patent. It is the earliest known patent for the stereoscope.

Related items:
Brewster-type stereoscope  Brewster, Sir David  D. S.  Ferrier père, fils & Soulier  Glass stereoview  Langenheim brothers

Patents and registrations:

Number: 13069
Système d'instrument dit stéréoscope, faisant paraître en relief des images photographiques faites sur des surfaces planes, même sur des matières transparentes du verre, etc., et pouvant projeter les images agrandies sur des écrans
Filing: 23-03-1852, Applicant(s): Louis Jules Duboscq. via: archives.inpi.fr

Further reading: