Malby's Terrestrial globe, 1876

Malby & Son. fl.1851-c.1884.
Malby's Terrestrial globe compiled from the globes of the Society for the Diffu[sio]n of Useful Knowledge. London: 37 Parker Street, dated 1876.
Malby & Son. fl.1851-c.1884.
Malby's Terrestrial globe compiled from the globes of the Society for the Diffu[sio]n of Useful Knowledge. London: 37 Parker Street, dated 1876. Terrestrial pocket globe, diameter 3 inches (77 mm). Made up of 12 hand-colored blue printed engraved gores laid over a plaster sphere, iron polar pins. Set in the lower half of a a green painted wooden case (without lid). Original varnish, lightly rubbed.
The firm of Thomas Malby continued under his son from 1851, and he was still in business as late as 1884. This pocket globe is a reissue of the gores of Thomas Malby's 3 inch globe of 1844, but with the lettering unusually printed in blue ink and then hand-colored. Thomas Malby closely allied himself with the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge as a way of marketing his products to the rising middle class of Britain. As a 1876 product it was slightly anachronistic, almost certainly one of the last British pocket globes of the 19th century to be produced. By 1876, the fashion for a gentleman to carry around a pocket globe had long passed.