Thomas Cooke
(1807-1868)

British instrument maker and maker of telescopes of world renown

Died aged c. 61

Thomas Cooke (8 March 1807 – 19 October 1868) was a British scientific instrument maker based in York. He founded T. Cooke & Sons, the scientific instrument company.

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Commemorated on 3 plaques

Thomas Cooke (1807-1868) British instrument maker. Born in Allerthorpe, son of a shoemaker. He became a maker of telescopes of world renown.

opposite the church, Allerthorpe, United Kingdom where they was born (1807)

This Observatory was built by the Yorkshire Philosophical Society following the inaugural meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science in 1831. It has an earlier rotating roof designed by John Smeaton who also designed the Eddystone Lighthouse. The Observatory housed what was for many years the largest refracting telescope in the world, designed and built by Thomas Cook of York, whose firm also built the Greenwich transit instrument. It was restored and refitted to mark the British Associations 150th Anniversary meeting in York in 1981 and was officially opened by its President H.R.H. the Duke of Kent, G.C.M.G., G.C.V.O.

Museum Gardens, York, United Kingdom where they built

Thomas Cooke FRAS 1807-1868 Optical Instrument Maker designed the 1850 refracting telescope in this observatory built by the Yorkshire Philosophical Society 1833

York Observatory, Museum Trust, York, United Kingdom where they designed (1850)