Customer Reviews

The Ocean at Home: An Illustrated History of the Aquarium

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The Ocean at Home is a wonderful book that outlines the early history of the private and public aquariums. When I entered this hobby back in the mid 90's I had no idea that the origin of the aquarium had such a full history. The history of our hobby is one subject that seems to get overlooked in many of our aquatic publications to date. This book walks the reader thru the progression from keeping plants and snails in small jars to the appearance of the first public aquariums. In reading this book you become familiar with the 150+ years of development and discovery for the modern aquarium.

There are so many illustrations in the book nearly every page has at least one illustration on it helping depict the aquarium or equipment of the given era. With the aid of the illustrations the reader has to wonder what aquariums 100 or even 150 years ago would have looked like. How where they heated? How was the water filtered? What a wondrous site it must have been to the children and adults of the 19th century to be able to observe the creatures from the deep as the book describes.

I highly recommend this book to any aquarist that wishes to discover more about the origins of the modern aquarium as well as some of the early challenges that 19th century aquarists faced.

The origin of the aquarium, what a topic! This informative, entertaining and sometimes poetic text tells the whole story and is a joy to read. How it was invented in England and how the idea traveled to Germany and to the United States. By the way, a handsome book in unusual size, profusely illustrated. Where the hell did the author find all these cute illustrations of aquariums and stuff related to it?

Excellent historial review of the origins of aquariums, public and private.

...but not real good either. Definitely not worth the full price. Short, light on details, and definitely euro-centric. It's not a bad little read, but don't expect a deep examination of aquarium history. Also, the physical construction of the book is curious...it's tall, thin and tightly bound, making it difficult to hold comfortably. The print isn't the darkest or the most legible, and most of the illustrations (which are the best part of the book) are small, although clearly reproduced. This would have made a perfect library book.