Humphry Davy's Notebooks: How Poetry Helped Create Scientific Knowledge

In 2019, AHRC funding enabled the crowdsourced transcriptions of five notebooks kept by the nineteenth-century chemist, Sir Humphry Davy, between 1795 and 1805. Transcriptions of these notebooks revealed Davy's creative mind at work: lines of poetry were written among descriptions of chemical experiments, philosophical musings, geological drawings, and accounts of his life. With this new project, we will crowdsource transcriptions of his entire notebook collection: there are 65 held at the Royal Institution of Great Britain (RI), in London, and five held in Kresen Kernow in Redruth, Cornwall.
Davy kept notebooks throughout his life but most of the pages of these notebooks have never been transcribed before. The notebooks show that he was writing poetry in the laboratory while conducting scientific experiments. Most entries have yet to be dated or considered in the light of what they tell us about Davy, his scientific discoveries, and the relationship between poetry and science. We will crowdsource transcriptions of the notebooks using the people-powered research platform Zooniverse. Online and in-person discussions with participants will enable us to find out how transcribing Davy's notebooks changes their view of how poetry and science could co-exist today. The consequences of seeing the arts and sciences as divided and separate are serious. Viewing them as 'two cultures' hinders our ability to solve major world problems. Speaking to a named priority area in the AHRC's 2019 Delivery Plan, 'Arts and science, arts in science', this project will ask what we can learn from the example of Davy's notebooks that will help us rethink what we understand about the relationship between the arts and sciences in the nineteenth century and today.
Davy was the foremost 'man of science' of his time. He isolated more chemical elements than any individual has before or since. Between October and December 1815, he invented a miners' safety lamp that came to be known as the Davy Lamp, saving countless lives in Britain and Europe and vastly improving the nation's industrial capability. He also led a fascinating life, rising up through society's ranks from relatively modest origins to become the President of the Royal Society. His politics and religious beliefs changed from radical to conservative as his career progressed. Davy is not currently associated with poetry or well known as a poet, but the notebooks show that he was writing poetry in the laboratory while conducting scientific experiments throughout his life. Many of these poems will be transcribed and published for the first time on the Lancaster Digital Library and in a selected print edition.
We will disseminate research findings, encourage participation in the project, and ask key questions in our public engagement and impact events, which include two transcribe-a-thons, a map-a-thon, a workshop on how to use the newly-developed transcription tools in other crowdsourcing projects, an academic conference on poetry in nineteenth-century scientific notebooks, a computer masterclass using data produced by the project, and an event that will consider Davy's attitude to race. We will also create an exhibition of Davy's and others' notebooks held at the RI, which will travel to the north-west and north-east of England.
We will present two panel sessions at academic conferences and produce a special issue of an academic journal on the results of the project. The already-existing Massive Online Open Course (MOOC), previously funded by the AHRC, will be enhanced to feature new tasks specifically on the notebooks. Final transcriptions of whole collection of notebooks will be published, with images of the pages themselves, on the Lancaster Digital Library, with improved new and exciting features. An accompanying project website will present a map of Davy's life, utilising the information that emerges from this project and a previous AHRC-funded project on Davy's letters.

1. Zooniverse participants: There are 1.9 million Zooniverse researchers and our pilot project reached 505 of these, 77 of whom responded to a survey. We know something of our audience due to this survey: e.g. they were mainly UK women. Of the total respondents 29.7% were over 65 years old and 45.8% held a postgraduate degree. The survey also revealed the perceived benefits of the work: 62.2% benefited by learning new research and technical skills. Additionally, respondents enjoyed contributing towards a 'real' research project (93.2%), helping to preserve manuscript materials (87.8%), and increased personal satisfaction (78.4%). The new tools we develop will provide a prototype for creators of other Zooniverse transcription projects.
2. The people who come to the transcribe-a-thon and map-a-thon events: These events will bring people into universities (and use their computer rooms). We will use the Press Offices and Impact Officers at Lancaster, Manchester, and UCL universities to ensure that we reach as inclusive and diverse an audience as possible. Numbers are limited to 20 because of the intensive nature of the activity. The benefits are detailed above. Transcribing and mapping will lead to better understanding of Davy's work, his poetry and the symbiosis of poetry and science in the nineteenth century, and offer transferable skills.
3. The Solihull and Birmingham Jamaican and Caribbean Family History Society: This society has been meeting for many decades and has a particular interest in tracing family histories from Jamaica and the Caribbean. Society members tend to be from first- or second-generation immigrant families. Benefits will include knowledge of Davy's life and career, and contribution to, and opportunity to shape, an ongoing research project.
4. Digital Masterclass at the Royal Institution: These are hands-on and interactive extracurricular sessions for keen young people all around the UK delivered in a purpose-built room in the Royal Institution. Groups of c.25 Year 9 students are drawn from a range of local schools, ensuring a good mix in terms of state/independent schools, genders and ethnicities. Benefits include helping students see that the STEM subjects and careers are for everyone.
5. MOOC participants: We surveyed MOOC participants for the first run in 2017; this gives us insight into audiences for our proposed new project. The 769 people who completed these surveys respectively revealed the range of people interested in Davy, including: ex-miners; dentists; anaesthetists; drug counsellors; chemists; historical novelists; geologists; and museum workers. MOOC feedback demonstrated benefit to users. Benefits include learning a new skill and being part of a community.
6. Royal Institution exhibition and open day visitors: Audiences for previous AHRC-funded Davy projects have visited the RI's building and museum. Over 67,000 visited the RI museum in 2018. One MOOC participant said they would take their grandchildren on their next visit to London. At a 2017 open day at the RI, 45 people attended to see the notebooks: one unique benefit is the opportunity to personally experience historical artefacts of national importance.
7. Visitors to the Wordsworth Trust and County Hall, Morpeth exhibitions: The Wordsworth Trust's Audience Development Plan for 2019 gives us a sense of who visits the museum: in 2016, 38,872 people, including 8,142 young people in formal education and 4,813 via general outreach (including vulnerable adults and families). Our exhibition will enhance the Wordsworth Trust's offering and benefit by increasing awareness that science and poetry were aligned in the Romantic period. The exhibition will also travel to the foyer of County Hall, Morpeth, a thoroughfare for officers and members of the Council and members of the public who visit for County Council services. The additional benefit for this region, which was once dominated by mining, is to experience heritage first hand.