Having written extensively on creative communities and the institutions they establish, let me offer a bibliography that might prove helpful. The focus here is on the British case, particularly during the nineteenth century. As background, here are several history of science pieces that are helpful ? Cannon, Susan Faye. 1978. *Science in Culture: the early Victorian Period*. New York: Science History Publications. (This is Cannon on the Cambridge network of science. Early British mathematical economics grew out of this network). Cohen, I. Bernard. 1985. *Revolution in Science.* Belknap Press of the Harvard University Press, Cambridge. _____. 1987. ?Scientific Revolutions, Revolutions in Science, and a Probabilistic Revolution 1800 -- 1930.? in *The Probabilistic Revolution*, vol 1, ed. by Lorenz Kruger, Lorraine J. Daston, and Michael Heidelberger. M.I.T. Press, Cambridge. 23?44. Hacking, Ian. 1987. ?Was there a Probabilistic Revolution 1800 -- 1930??, *The Probabilistic Revolution*, ed. by Lorenz Kruger, Lorraine J. Daston, and Michael Heidelberger, M.I.T. Press, Cambridge. Vol. 1, 45?58. Morrell, Jack and Arnold Thackray. 1981. *Gentlemen of Science, Early Years of the British Association for the Advancement of Science*. Oxford University Press, Oxford. Yeo, Richard. 1981. ?Scientific Method and the Image of Science, 1831--1890? *The Parliament of Science: The British Association for the Advancement of Science, 1831--1981* edited by Roy MacLeod and Peter Collins. Science Reviews, Ltd., Northwood. _____. 1986. ?Scientific Method and the Rhetoric of Science in Britain, 1830 - 1917? *The Politics and Rhetoric of Scientific Method: Historical Studies* edited by John A. Schuster and Richard R. Yeo. D. Reidel Publishing Company, Dordrecht. History of Economics items Checkland, S.G. 1951 ?The advent of academic economics in England.? *The Mancester School*. 19 (January), pp. 43 - 70. _____. 1949. ?The propagation of Ricardian economics in England.? *Economica* 16 (February) pp. 40 - 52. Coats, A. W. 1968. ?The Origins and Early Development of the Royal Economic Society.? *Economic Journal*. LXXVIII, No. 310 (June), 349?371. (Treats the founding of the British (later Royal) Economic Association and the *Economic Journal*) Goldman, Lawrence. 1983. ?The Origins of British "Social Science': Political Economy, Natural Science and Statistics 1830 - 1835.? *The Historical Journal*. 26, No. 3, pp. 587 - 616. _____. 1986. ?The Social Science Association, 1857 -- 1886: a context for mid-Victorian Liberalism,? *The English Historical Review,* January, vol. CI, 95?134. _____. 1987. ?A Peculiarity of the English? The Social Science Association and the Absence of Sociology in Nineteenth-Century Britain,? *Past and Present*, February, No. 114, 133?171. Henderson, James P. 1996. ?Emerging Learned Societies: economic ideas in context? *J.H.E.T.* Fall 1996, pp. 186 - 206. (This is my 1996 Presidential Address to the H.E.S. which reviews the four British learned societies before the founding of the R.E.S. Those learned societies were ? the Political Economy Club of London, Section F of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, the London (later Royal) Statistical Society, and the National Association for the Promotion of Social Science a.k.a. the Social Science Association. ______. 1983. ?The oral tradition in British economics: influential economists in the Political Economy Club of London? *H.O.P.E.* vol. 15, pp. 149 - 179. (Reviews the first 100 years of the Pol. Ec. Club of London). ______. 1994. ?The place of economics in the hierarchy of sciences: Section F from Whewell to Edgeworth?. In *Natural Images in Economic Thought: ?markets read in tooth and claw.?* ed. By Philip Mirowski. Cambridge University Press. (Treats Section F of the British Association for the Advancement of Science up to the early 20th century. _____. 1996. *Early British Mathematical Economics: William Whewell and the British Case.* Rowman and Littlefield. (Considers the ?Whewell Group of Mathematical Economists? a sub-set of the Cambridge network of science. Includes the founding of Section F and the London (later Royal) Statistical Society.) Porter, Ted. 1994. ?Rigor and practicality: rival ideals of quantification in nineteenth-century economics?. In *Natural Images in Economic Thought: ?markets read in tooth and claw.? ed. By Philip Mirowski. Cambridge University Press. Hope this is helpful. James P. Henderson