Rev Oscar Overlap Oppenheimer . . . . The A to Z of Slightly Strange Unknown Victorian Inventors and Explorers

Rev Oscar Overlap Oppenheimer

An old fashioned fire and brimstone vicar the Rev Oscar Overlap Oppenheimer certainly knew how to keep the masses on the straight and narrow and no hanky-panky was going to be going on in his parish. But he also was a man of science and said that it was his duty to understand the finer detail of Gods greater plan. His own particular area of knowledge being optics, and he had a huge collection of prisms lenses and mirrors and was a fastidious recorder of data from his many experiments with light.  It was during one of his experiments that he realized that there was no defined scale for the levels of light and shade so the Rev Oppenheimer invented the Oppenheimer Christian Grey Scale.  It was known as the Christian Grey Scale of Shade as the Rev Oscar Overlap Oppenheimer wanted to ensure that his work was associated with the hand of God. Not some sort of deviant sort of scientific invention such as the Barometric Bellows which he condemned in his sermons on many an occasion.   

He carefully analyzed the many levels of light and shade for his scale and eventually settled at fifty grades of shade all with specific intensities and all given a simple common name and description as well as a scientific code reference. So for the simple layman . . . . WOW that’s black I can’t see the cat. . . . meant it was very dark, and . . . . . WOW that’s bright I can’t see the cat . . .  meant is was bright seriously bright.

The Oppenheimer Christian Grey Scale has fallen out of use these days and no one mentions the fifty grades of shade any more but it is said that the Ghost of the Rev Oscar Overlap Oppenheimer has started to appear in bookshops in the last couple of years at night and is not happy.