Lucy Baldwin analgesia apparatus, British, 1955-1980.
© Science Museum / Science & Society Picture Library
This anaesthetic machine provides a mixture of oxygen and nitrous oxide through a facemask and was used in midwifery. The apparatus is on wheels in order to make it portable. The kit was made by the British Oxygen Company Limited, London, and was developed in the late 1950s. It was named after Lady Baldwin (1859-1945), wife of the British Prime Minister, who set up an anaesthetics fund to supply nitrous oxide and air machines for labour wards in 1930.