It's now 2025. We visited the RCO a few weeks ago to film John's instruments in the their care, and being used by the extraordinary eye surgeon (and magician!) Ananth Viswanathan. It's been nearly 10 years since John's death and it's a privilege to have had a part documenting his remarkable legacy

Hospitals in the global north tend to use disposable instruments, so John's collection represents an obsolete craft. He was keen his work was preserved, so entrusted his collection to Roger, who a decade later found a home for it at the Royal College of Ophthalmologists in London 2/3

You're right, of course. I apologise to the nacho-munching community!

I didn't think my first post in weeks would be about nachos ... I'll now have to temper this was something deep and meaningful!

🤣

I don't charge her, Margaret! 😉

Thanks so much! Are you the Stuart Semmel who wrote Napoleon and the British? (If so, I read you back in my PhD days!)

Surely there's a lesson here: we should think twice before letting the rich run our societies. Even the best of them have blind spots. If a man as famously ethical as Boulton can deny humanity to a child, what can we expect of the even more individualistic rich today?

Anyway, here's the story!

4/4

What I can't quite wrap my head around is that Matthew Boulton is celebrated for his stance against slavery and famously looked after his own workers into their old age. You get the sense, reading his letters, he has a tender heart. So, why did he think it okay to see a child's body as property? 3/4

We sometimes celebrate the eighteenth century as a time of individualism (big issue today too!). And the stories of Matthew and Anne Boulton are both stories of strong individuals. But when it came to the girl who sold her tooth for a guinea, they don't even bother to find out her name 2/4

I can oblige! We've finished the rough cut of the film and I'll be sure to share when it's done (though it's really rather more upsetting than I thought it'd be)

Or maybe a new income stream for JanePlan