I started reading deeply in my first source for the history paper this evening. I briefly mentioned (second to last paragraph) that I was considering moving away from the history of machine tools as a topic. I am glad I did not return the books on that feeling because it has turned out to be surprisingly interesting. These early industrial pioneers were able to create, with their own hands and almost from scratch, powerful and precise means of shaping material. The enginuity needed to devise these machines was quite impressive. By 1776, could "[bore] a 72-inch cylinder being not further from absolute truth than the thickness of a thin sixpence in the worst part." The book captures the essence of this innovative thinking, and is much less dry than I had feared.
It also has a lot of cool pictures. The last half of one of my other sources is filled with several hundred schematics, patent illustrations, and photographs of modern reconstructions of industrial tools. House-size engines, borers the size of a person, water-powered lathes, grinders, drills— all sorts of interesting machines. Very .
I made heavy use of my highlighter for the Kepler paper because I owned my main source. I cannot do that with library books, so I bought about 200 sticky tabs with which to mark important lines. Two chapters in, and the book already looks like it is supporting a jagged, neon pink fungus.
A book a week, then another week of writing, and this paper could be almost doable.