Societies and Academies: How Organized Science Took Shape, 1660 to 1949

Founded on 28 November 1660 at Gresham College by twelve natural philosophers including Christopher Wren and Robert Boyle, with a royal charter in 1662. Its journal Philosophical Transactions, begun in 1665, is credited with pioneering external review before publication.

Founded in Paris in 1666 at the suggestion of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, with a first small group meeting on 22 December 1666 in the King's library. It was reorganised with formal statutes in 1699, giving the French answer to the Royal Society under royal patronage.

Founded on 7 March 1799 on a proposal by Benjamin Thompson, Count Rumford, to bring science to the public through lectures and demonstrations. It received its Royal Charter in 1800 and has run the Christmas Lectures since Michael Faraday began them in 1825.

Founded in 1807 by thirteen members meeting at the Freemasons' Tavern, and described by the Society as the oldest geological society in the world. It conferred the first Wollaston Medal on William Smith in February 1831.

Formed in Boston on 27 November 1839 by William Cogswell, Richard Fletcher, John Dix Fisher, Oliver Peabody and Lemuel Shattuck. It is the second oldest continuously operating professional society in the United States and took its present name in February 1840.

Chartered by an Act of Congress signed by Abraham Lincoln in 1863, during the Civil War, so that the federal government would have a body able to certify scientific findings. The Act named its fifty incorporating members.

Held its inaugural meeting on 16 January 1865 with Augustus De Morgan in the chair. Its Proceedings have run continuously since its founding year, and it received a royal charter in 1965, a century later.

Founded in London on 4 March 1911 as the Biochemical Club, after an organizing meeting called by John Addyman Gardner and Robert Henry Aders Plimmer. It took its present name in 1913 and now publishes the Biochemical Journal through Portland Press.

Founded on 28 December 1915 in Columbus, Ohio, when about fifty scientists meeting alongside the American Association for the Advancement of Science voted to form it, with Victor E. Shelford as first president. It shows a young field organizing itself.

Established in Beijing on 1 November 1949 by state decree, consolidating the Nationalist-era Academia Sinica and the Beiping Academy of Sciences. It now runs more than a hundred research institutes, a state-founded model unlike the member-founded societies earlier on this path.