[Walter Rosenhain, distinguished metallurgist of German-Jewish extraction, grew up in Australia, lived in England.] Six Typed Letters Signed, Two Autograph Letters Signed, and one Typed Note Signed to G. K. Menzies, Secretary, Royal Society of Arts.

See his entries in the Oxford DNB and Australian Dictionary of Biography. The recipient George Kenneth Menzies (1869-1954) was Secretary to the Royal Society of Arts between 1917 and 1935. The nine items are in good condition, lightly aged, and are folded for postage. Each bears the stamp of the RSA, some with manuscript docketting. Letters of 4 April and 18 September 1925 are in autograph, the rest typed; all nine are signed ‘Walter Rosesnhain’. A letter of 1 October 1924 responds to a request for information about zirconium, with reference to the ‘literature’ on the subject and British and American firms ‘interested in Zirconium products’. The rest of the correspondence is taken up with lecturing. The first item (ANS, 2 February 1915) is a covering note for ‘the synopsis of my forthcoming course of Cantor Lectures’. On 13 September 1924 Rosenhaim writes that he could ‘quite well give either one lecture or a course of three during the coming Autumn and Winter. The subject I habe in mind is the Inner Structure of Alloys, on which I gave a Royal Institution Friday lecture last year. While it is possible to deal with the subject in a single lecture, it would be much more satisfactory to give a course of three lectures upon it. The subject really relates to the X-ray study of crystal structures and its application to metallurgical problems and consitutes, I think, perhaps the most important metallurgical advance which has been achieved recently.’ He asks for a quick response, as his ‘Winter engagements have a way of piling up during the year’. On 4 April 1925 he states that he has ‘mentioned the matter of Cantor lectures to one or two of my colleagues & I think either Mr. Higgins or one of the others might give a course on such a subject as “Thermometers” or possibly “High Vacua’, but before approaching them he would like to clarify the question of a fee. ‘I am also interested in the matter because, although about a month has now elapsed since my recent course was finished, I have received no fee & I am wondering whether a letter may have gone astray.’ The matter is presumably resolved, as a few weeks later, on 30 April 1925, he sends (not present) ‘a memorandum on the subject of a course to be entitled “Thermometry” by Mr W. F. Higgins of this Laboratory’, and mentions that ‘[t]here is also a possible suggestion of a course entitled “The Production and Measurement of High Vacua” with experimental demonstrations by Dr G. W. C. Kaye’, both of which courses he thinks ‘would be very satisfactory for your Society but that of Dr Kaye would be particularly interesting and would, I think, attract a considerable audience as the whole problem of high vacua is becoming of every [sic] increasing importance in connexion with electric lamps and radio valves’. On 8 January 1926 he wonders whether Higgins’s communication with Menzies regarding a proposed lecture has also ‘gone astray’, and agrees to review ‘Sir Robert Hadfield’s book on Metallurgy’ for the RSA journal, ‘provided that the review may be anonymous. I very much object to writing signed reviews’. On 11 February 1926 he asks for an offprint of a lecture by Sir Richard Paget: ‘I may be able to obtain a copy by asking Sir Richard Paget himself, but I would prefer not to trouble him if it can be got from you.’