Edward Emerson Barnard (December 16, 1857 – February 6, 1923) was an American
astronomer
An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses their studies on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. They observe astronomical objects such as stars, planets, moons, comets and galaxies – in either ...
. He was commonly known as E. E. Barnard, and was recognized as a gifted observational astronomer. He is best known for his discovery of the high proper motion of
Barnard's Star
Barnard's Star is a red dwarf about six light-years from Earth in the constellation of Ophiuchus. It is the fourth-nearest-known individual star to the Sun after the three components of the Alpha Centauri system, and the closest star in t ...
in 1916, which is named in his honor.
Early life
Barnard was born in
Nashville, Tennessee
Nashville is the capital city of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the seat of Davidson County. With a population of 689,447 at the 2020 U.S. census, Nashville is the most populous city in the state, 21st most-populous city in the U.S., and ...
, to Reuben Barnard and Elizabeth Jane Barnard (''née'' Haywood), and had one brother. His father died three months before his birth, so he grew up in an impoverished family and did not receive much in the way of formal education. His first interest was in the field of
photography
Photography is the art, application, and practice of creating durable images by recording light, either electronically by means of an image sensor, or chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as photographic film. It is emplo ...
, and he became a photographer's assistant at the age of nine.
He later developed an interest in astronomy. In 1876 he purchased a refractor
telescope
A telescope is a device used to observe distant objects by their emission, absorption, or reflection of electromagnetic radiation. Originally meaning only an optical instrument using lenses, curved mirrors, or a combination of both to obse ...
, and in 1881 he discovered his first
comet
A comet is an icy, small Solar System body that, when passing close to the Sun, warms and begins to release gases, a process that is called outgassing. This produces a visible atmosphere or coma, and sometimes also a tail. These phenomena ...
, but failed to announce his discovery. He found his second comet later the same year and a third in 1882.
While he was still working at a photography studio he was married to the British-born Rhoda Calvert in 1881. In the 1880s,
Hulbert Harrington Warner
Hulbert Harrington Warner (1842–1923) was a Rochester, Monroe County, New York, Rochester, New York businessman and philanthropist who made his fortune from the sales of patent medicine.
Biography
He was born near Syracuse, New York, in a smal ...
offered US$200 per discovery of a new comet. Barnard discovered a total of five, and used the money to build a house for himself and his wife.
With his name being brought to the attention of amateur astronomers in Nashville, they collectively raised enough money to give Barnard a
fellowship
A fellow is a concept whose exact meaning depends on context.
In learned or professional societies, it refers to a privileged member who is specially elected in recognition of their work and achievements.
Within the context of higher educatio ...
to
Vanderbilt University
Vanderbilt University (informally Vandy or VU) is a private research university in Nashville, Tennessee. Founded in 1873, it was named in honor of shipping and rail magnate Cornelius Vanderbilt, who provided the school its initial $1-million ...
. He never graduated from the school, but did receive the only honorary degree Vanderbilt has ever awarded. He joined the staff of the
Lick Observatory
The Lick Observatory is an astronomical observatory owned and operated by the University of California. It is on the summit of Mount Hamilton, in the Diablo Range just east of San Jose, California, United States. The observatory is managed by t ...
in 1887, though he later clashed with the director, Edward S. Holden, over access to observing time on the larger instruments and other issues of research and management.
Astronomical work
Barnard saw the
gegenschein
Gegenschein (; ; ) or counterglow is a faintly bright spot in the night sky centered at the antisolar point. The backscatter of sunlight by interplanetary dust causes this optical phenomenon.
Explanation
Like zodiacal light, gegenschein is ...
in 1882, not aware of earlier papers by Theodor Brorsen and T. W. Backhouse. In 1889 he observed the moon
Iapetus
In Greek mythology, Iapetus (; ; grc, Ἰαπετός, Iapetós), also Japetus, is a Titan, the son of Uranus and Gaia and father of Atlas (mythology), Atlas, Prometheus, Epimetheus (mythology), Epimetheus, and Menoetius (mythology), Menoetius. ...
pass behind Saturn's rings. As he watched Iapetus pass through the space between Saturn's innermost rings and the planet itself, he saw a shadow pass over the moon. Although he did not realize it at the time, he had discovered proof of the "
spokes
A spoke is one of some number of rods radiating from the center of a wheel (the hub where the axle connects), connecting the hub with the round traction surface.
The term originally referred to portions of a log that had been riven (split l ...
" of
Saturn
Saturn is the sixth planet from the Sun and the second-largest in the Solar System, after Jupiter. It is a gas giant with an average radius of about nine and a half times that of Earth. It has only one-eighth the average density of Earth; h ...
, dark shadows running perpendicular to the circular paths of the rings. These spokes were doubted at first, but confirmed by the spacecraft ''
Voyager 1
''Voyager 1'' is a space probe launched by NASA on September 5, 1977, as part of the Voyager program to study the outer Solar System and interstellar space beyond the Sun's heliosphere. Launched 16 days after its twin '' Voyager 2'', ''V ...
''.
In 1892 he made observations of a
nova
A nova (plural novae or novas) is a transient astronomical event that causes the sudden appearance of a bright, apparently "new" star (hence the name "nova", which is Latin for "new") that slowly fades over weeks or months. Causes of the dramat ...
and was the first to notice the gaseous emissions, thus deducing that it was a stellar explosion. The same year he also discovered Amalthea, the fifth moon of
Jupiter
Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the largest in the Solar System. It is a gas giant with a mass more than two and a half times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined, but slightly less than one-thousand ...
. He was the first to discover a new moon of Jupiter since
Galileo Galilei
Galileo di Vincenzo Bonaiuti de' Galilei (15 February 1564 – 8 January 1642) was an Italian astronomer, physicist and engineer, sometimes described as a polymath. Commonly referred to as Galileo, his name was pronounced (, ). He ...
in 1609. This was the last satellite discovered by visual observation (rather than by examining photographic plates or other recorded images).
In 1895 he joined the
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chicago is consistently ranked among the b ...
as
professor
Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an academic rank at universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin as a "person who professes". Professo ...
of astronomy. There he was able to use the telescope at
Yerkes Observatory
Yerkes Observatory ( ) is an astronomical observatory located in Williams Bay, Wisconsin, United States. The observatory was operated by the University of Chicago Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics from its founding in 1897 to 2018. Owner ...
. Much of his work during this period was taking
photograph
A photograph (also known as a photo, image, or picture) is an image created by light falling on a photosensitive surface, usually photographic film or an electronic image sensor, such as a CCD or a CMOS chip. Most photographs are now create ...
s of the
Milky Way
The Milky Way is the galaxy that includes our Solar System, with the name describing the galaxy's appearance from Earth: a hazy band of light seen in the night sky formed from stars that cannot be individually distinguished by the naked eye. ...
. Together with
Max Wolf
Maximilian Franz Joseph Cornelius Wolf (21 June 1863 – 3 October 1932) was a German astronomer and a pioneer in the field of astrophotography. He was the chairman of astronomy at the University of Heidelberg and director of the Heidelberg-K ...
, he discovered that certain dark regions of the
galaxy
A galaxy is a system of stars, stellar remnants, interstellar gas, dust, dark matter, bound together by gravity. The word is derived from the Greek ' (), literally 'milky', a reference to the Milky Way galaxy that contains the Solar System ...
were actually clouds of gas and dust that obscured the more distant stars in the background. From 1905, his niece Mary R. Calvert worked as his assistant and
computer
A computer is a machine that can be programmed to carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations ( computation) automatically. Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic sets of operations known as programs. These prog ...
.
The faint
Barnard's Star
Barnard's Star is a red dwarf about six light-years from Earth in the constellation of Ophiuchus. It is the fourth-nearest-known individual star to the Sun after the three components of the Alpha Centauri system, and the closest star in t ...
is named for Edward Barnard after he discovered in 1916 that it had a very large
proper motion
Proper motion is the astrometric measure of the observed changes in the apparent places of stars or other celestial objects in the sky, as seen from the center of mass of the Solar System, compared to the abstract background of the more distan ...
Sun
The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is a nearly perfect ball of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core. The Sun radiates this energy mainly as light, ultraviolet, and infrared radi ...
, second only to the
Alpha Centauri
Alpha Centauri ( Latinized from α Centauri and often abbreviated Alpha Cen or α Cen) is a triple star system in the constellation of Centaurus. It consists of 3 stars: Alpha Centauri A (officially Rigil Kentaurus), Alpha Centa ...
Barnard Catalogue
The astronomer Edward Emerson Barnard compiled a list of dark nebulae known as the ''Barnard Catalogue of Dark Markings in the Sky'', or the ''Barnard Catalogue'' for short. The nebulae listed by Barnard have become known as Barnard objects. A 1919 ...
lists a series of
dark nebula
A dark nebula or absorption nebula is a type of interstellar cloud, particularly molecular clouds, that is so dense that it obscures the visible wavelengths of light from objects behind it, such as background stars and emission or reflection neb ...
e, known as Barnard objects, giving them numerical designations akin to the
Messier catalog
The Messier objects are a set of 110 astronomical objects catalogued by the French astronomer Charles Messier in his ''Catalogue des Nébuleuses et des Amas d'Étoiles'' (''Catalogue of Nebulae and Star Clusters'').
Because Messier was only int ...
. They begin with and end with . He published his initial list with the 1919 paper in the ''
Astrophysical Journal
''The Astrophysical Journal'', often abbreviated ''ApJ'' (pronounced "ap jay") in references and speech, is a peer-reviewed scientific journal of astrophysics and astronomy, established in 1895 by American astronomers George Ellery Hale and Jam ...
Williams Bay, Wisconsin
Williams Bay is a village in Walworth County, Wisconsin, United States. It is one of three municipalities on Geneva Lake. The population was 2,564 at the 2010 census.
History
The village was named for Captain Israel Williams of Massachuset ...
, and was buried in Nashville. After his death, many examples from his exceptional collection of astronomical photographs were published in 1927 as ''A Photographic Atlas of Selected Regions of the Milky Way'', this work having been finished by Mary R. Calvert, and Edwin B. Frost, then director of Yerkes Observatory.
177P/Barnard
Comet 177P/Barnard, also known as Barnard 2, is a periodic comet with an orbital period of 122 years. It fits the classical definition of a Halley-type comet with (20 years <
American Academy of Arts and Sciences
The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, a ...
(1892)
*
Lalande Prize
The Lalande Prize (French: ''Prix Lalande'' also known as Lalande Medal) was an award for scientific advances in astronomy, given from 1802 until 1970 by the French Academy of Sciences.
The prize was endowed by astronomer Jérôme Lalande in 180 ...
(1892)
*
Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society
The Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society is the highest award given by the Royal Astronomical Society (RAS). The RAS Council have "complete freedom as to the grounds on which it is awarded" and it can be awarded for any reason. Past awar ...
(1897)
*Member of the
American Philosophical Society
The American Philosophical Society (APS), founded in 1743 in Philadelphia, is a scholarly organization that promotes knowledge in the sciences and humanities through research, professional meetings, publications, library resources, and communit ...
(1903)
*
Prix Jules Janssen
The Prix Jules Janssen is the highest award of the Société astronomique de France (SAF), the French astronomical society.
This annual prize is given to a professional French astronomer or to an astronomer of another nationality in recognition ...
, the highest award of the
Société astronomique de France
The Société astronomique de France (SAF; ), the French astronomical society, is a non-profit association in the public interest organized under French law ( Association loi de 1901). Founded by astronomer Camille Flammarion in 1887, its purpose ...
, the French astronomical society (1906)
*
Bruce Medal
The Catherine Wolfe Bruce Gold Medal is awarded every year by the Astronomical Society of the Pacific for outstanding lifetime contributions to astronomy. It is named after Catherine Wolfe Bruce, an American patroness of astronomy, and was fi ...
Asteroid
An asteroid is a minor planet of the inner Solar System. Sizes and shapes of asteroids vary significantly, ranging from 1-meter rocks to a dwarf planet almost 1000 km in diameter; they are rocky, metallic or icy bodies with no atmosphere. ...
Barnard's Loop
Barnard's Loop (catalogue designation Sh 2-276) is an emission nebula in the constellation of Orion. It is part of the Orion molecular cloud complex which also contains the dark Horsehead and bright Orion nebulae. The loop takes the form of ...
*
Barnard's Star
Barnard's Star is a red dwarf about six light-years from Earth in the constellation of Ophiuchus. It is the fourth-nearest-known individual star to the Sun after the three components of the Alpha Centauri system, and the closest star in t ...
California
California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...
Blue Comet
The ''Blue Comet'' was a named passenger train operated by Central Railroad of New Jersey from 1929 to 1941 between the New York metropolitan area and Atlantic City.
Designed by Central Railroad of New Jersey (CNJ) president R.B. White in 192 ...
, featured a baggage car named after "Barnard". The train ran from 1929 to 1941.
Barnard 68
Barnard 68 is a molecular cloud, dark absorption nebula or Bok globule, towards the southern constellation Ophiuchus and well within the Milky Way galaxy at a distance of about 500 light-years, so close that not a single star can be seen between i ...
California Nebula
The California Nebula ( NGC 1499/ Sh2-220) is an emission nebula located in the constellation Perseus. Its name comes from its resemblance to the outline of the US State of California in long exposure photographs. It is almost 2.5° long on the ...