Description | Blackett kept his notes and drafts either among his working papers or in bulky folders labelled simply 'Cosmic ray lectures', each folder containing perhaps a dozen different lectures. These scattered manuscripts have been brought together and listed below in one chronological sequence. Those lectures which have been extracted from the working papers are cross-referenced to the folder in which they were originally found (ie B.70 and B.107).
Many of the notes for lectures are very brief jottings, occupying only one or two pages. Places and precise dates of delivery are given in the handlist were possible. Many of the later lectures are in the form of reminiscences of early cosmic ray research and thus provide interesting historical and biographical information. Other semi-autobiographical lectures which touch upon Blackett's work on particle disintegration or cosmic rays may be found in Section H. See also under Rutherford in the general index.
Occasionally, a lecture was directly related to the working notes with which it was found. These were left in situ and are briefly noted here for ease of reference: Copenhagen, 1931 (B.29); Gassiot Conference, 1948 (B.58), Florence, 1948 (B.35); paris, 1950 (B.48); Oxford, 1950 (B.49) and Bombay, 1950 (B.49).
Some of the publications listed below do not appear in the Royal Society bibliography. See especially B.115, B.116, B.120. |