Hooke's Micrographia. Robert Hooke (1635-1703) was appointed curator of experiments at the Royal Society of London in 1662, shortly after its founding in 1660. He used a compound microscope to observe a wide range of specimens and then published the results of his remarkably detailed observations in Micrographia in 1665. Examples of his illustrations include the study of the head of a large drone fly (see image Z340/661), a flea (see image Z375/011) and a blue fly (see image Z340/101).