The Gyroscope (Its Laws and Mysteries), a Non-Mathematical Explanation.

Tientsin and Peiping: Peiyang Press, February, 1933. First edition (pp. 23).  Large octavo (26 cm) in stiff blue wraps, pictorial cover (a gyroscope), illustrated with eight elegantly hand-drawn figures depicting various aspects of the gyroscope. Theodore Bodde was a Dutch-born electrical engineer who migrated to the United States at the turn of the twentieth century , aged about twenty-seven. In addition to teaching physics and drawing at Norwich University in Vermont, he designed a number of devices for which he held patents, both in his own name and with others. In 1919 he accepted an invitation to teach physics at Nyang College, Shanghai, returning to the U. S.  at the end of the academic year in 1922. While Bodde was himself not in China at the date of publication, his son Derk was in his second year of studies at Peiping, having been awarded the Harvard-Yenching fellowship. A noted Sinologist, he taught for many years at the University of Pennsylvania. This document has the ear-marks of a posthumous tribute— the author is described on the title page as “Teacher, Inventor, Engineer”, but it might just as well been a festschrift to honour his father, the drawings and text having been found among Bodde’s notes. It is, whatever its origins, an elegant little book…  although it must be said Bodde did not in his discussion entirely foreswear certain, probably unavoidable, mathematical expressions. A Fine copy.