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Harvard College Observatory
The Harvard College Observatory (HCO) is an institution managing a complex of buildings and multiple instruments used for astronomical research by the Harvard University Department of Astronomy. It is located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, and was founded in 1839. With the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, it forms part of the Center for Astrophysics Harvard & Smithsonian. HCO houses the Harvard Plate Stacks, a collection of approximately 600,000 astronomical plates taken between the mid-1880s and 1989 (with a gap from 1953–1968). This 100-year coverage is a unique resource for studying temporal variations in the universe. The Digital Access to a Sky Century @ Harvard project scanned and 429,274 direct image plates, leaving nearly 200,000 spectra and other photographic plates yet to be digitized. In 2024, a new database, StarGlass, was created to combine the scientific data from the plates with the Plate Stack's archival holdings. History In 1839, the Ha ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Annie Jump Cannon
Annie Jump Cannon (; December 11, 1863 – April 13, 1941) was an American astronomer whose cataloging work was instrumental in the development of contemporary stellar classification. With Edward C. Pickering, she is credited with the creation of the Stellar classification, Harvard Classification Scheme, which was the first serious attempt to organize and classify stars based on their temperatures and spectral types. She was nearly deaf throughout her career after 1893, as a result of scarlet fever. She was a Suffragette, suffragist and a member of the National Woman's Party, National Women's Party. Personal life Cannon was born on December 11, 1863, in Dover, Delaware. She was the eldest of three daughters born to Wilson Cannon, a Delaware shipbuilder and state senator, and his second wife, Mary Jump. Cannon's mother was the first person to teach her the constellations and she encouraged her to follow her own interests, suggesting that she pursue studies in mathematics, chemistry ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Solon Irving Bailey
Solon Irving Bailey (December 29, 1854 – June 5, 1931) was an American astronomer and discoverer of the asteroid 504 Cora, on June 30, 1902. Bailey joined the staff of Harvard College Observatory in 1887. He received a bachelor's and master's from Boston University in 1881 and 1884, and a master's from Harvard University in 1888. After the observatory received the "Boyden Fund" bequest from the will of Uriah A. Boyden, Bailey played a major role in finding a site for Boyden Stationwaywiser.fas.harvard.edu/people/7478/boyden-station-arequipa in Arequipa, Peru, and was in charge of it from 1892 to 1919. He was also one of the first to carry out meteorological studies in Peru, traveling extensively in desolate areas at very high altitude. Boyden Station was moved to South Africa in 1927 due to better weather conditions and became known as the Boyden Observatory. He made extensive studies of variable stars in globular clusters in the southern skies. He also performed a light-cu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Edward Charles Pickering
Edward Charles Pickering (July 19, 1846 – February 3, 1919) was an American astronomer and physicist and the older brother of William Henry Pickering. Along with Carl Vogel, Pickering discovered the first spectroscopic binary stars. He wrote ''Elements of Physical Manipulations'' (2 vol., 1873–76). Personal life Pickering was born at 43 Bowdoin Street in Boston, Massachusetts, on July 19, 1846,Obituary, '' Boston Globe'', February 4, 1919 to a distinguished, cultivated family consisting of his brother, William Henry Pickering, father, Edward Pickering, and his mother, Charlotte Hammond. Edward's brother, William, was a graduate of MIT and professor of physics and astronomy. Edward was interested in the stars as a boy and constructed his own telescope by the age of 12. Pickering enjoyed his work at the observatory, but he also enjoyed mountain climbing and bicycling in earlier days and later he was an interested spectator of football games. He was co-founder and first pres ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Joseph Winlock (astronomer)
Joseph Winlock (February 6, 1826 – June 11, 1875) was an American astronomer and mathematician. Biography He was born in Shelby County, Kentucky, the grandson of General Joseph Winlock (1758–1831). After graduating from Shelby College in Kentucky in 1845, he was appointed professor of mathematics and astronomy at that institution. From 1852 until 1857 he worked as a computer for the '' American Ephemeris and Nautical Almanac'', and relocated to Cambridge, Massachusetts. He briefly served as head of the department of mathematics at the United States Naval Academy, but returned as superintendent of the Almanac office. He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1853. He married Isabella Washington in Shelbyville, Kentucky on December 10, 1856, and they had six children. In 1863 he was one of the fifty charter members of the National Academy of Sciences. Three year later in 1866 he became director of the Harvard College Observatory, succeeding G ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
George Phillips Bond
George Phillips Bond (May 20, 1825February 17, 1865) was an American astronomer. He was the son of William Cranch Bond. Some sources give his year of birth as 1826. His early interest was in nature and birds, but after his elder brother William Cranch Bond Jr. died, he felt obliged to follow his father into the field of astronomy. He succeeded his father as director of Harvard College Observatory from 1859 until his death. His cousin was Edward Singleton Holden, first director of Lick Observatory. Bond took the first photograph of a star in 1850 (Vega) and of a double star in 1857 (Mizar); suggested photography could be used to measure a star's magnitude; and discovered numerous comets (including C/1850 Q1) and calculated their orbits. Bond also studied Saturn and the Orion Nebula. He and his father jointly discovered Saturn's moon, Hyperion (which was also independently discovered by William Lassell). In addition to his astronomical contributions, Bond also surveyed the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bright Star Catalogue
The Bright Star Catalogue, also known as the Yale Catalogue of Bright Stars, Yale Bright Star Catalogue, or just YBS, is a star catalogue that lists all stars of stellar magnitude 6.5 or brighter, which is roughly every star visible to the naked eye from Earth. The catalog lists 9,110 objects, of which 9,095 are stars, 11 are novae or supernovae (which were "bright stars" only at the time when they were at their peak), and four are non-stellar objects which are the globular clusters 47 Tucanae (designated HR 95) and NGC 2808 (HR 3671), and the open clusters NGC 2281 (HR 2496) and Messier 67 (HR 3515). The catalogue is fixed in number of entries, but its data is maintained, and it is appended with a comments section about the objects that has been steadily enhanced. The abbreviation for the catalog as a whole is BS or YBS but all citations of stars it indexes use HR before the catalog number, a homage to the catalog's direct predecessor, published ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Yale University Observatory
The Yale University Observatory, also known as the Leitner Family Observatory and Planetarium, is an astronomical observatory owned and operated by Yale University, and maintained for student use. It is located in Farnham Memorial Gardens near the corner of Edwards and Prospect Streets, New Haven, Connecticut. In the 21st century, the Yale Student Observatory, the Leitner observatory also has public outreaches and supports astronomy for students of the college. However, the Yale Observatory traces its history back to being one of the first formal institutions for astronomical observation in the United States, dating to the 1830s. History In 1828 Sheldon Clark donated 1200 US dollars to Yale to procure a Dollond refracting telescope. Yale's first observatory, the Atheneum, was founded in 1830, situated in a tower. From 1830 it housed Yale's first refractor, a Dollond donated by Sheldon Clark. It was the largest in the United States at the time. With this telescope Olmsted and E ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Harvard Revised Photometry Catalogue
The Bright Star Catalogue, also known as the Yale Catalogue of Bright Stars, Yale Bright Star Catalogue, or just YBS, is a star catalogue that lists all stars of stellar magnitude 6.5 or brighter, which is roughly every star visible to the naked eye from Earth. The catalog lists 9,110 objects, of which 9,095 are stars, 11 are novae or supernovae (which were "bright stars" only at the time when they were at their peak), and four are non-stellar objects which are the globular clusters 47 Tucanae (designated HR 95) and NGC 2808 (HR 3671), and the open clusters NGC 2281 (HR 2496) and Messier 67 (HR 3515). The catalogue is fixed in number of entries, but its data is maintained, and it is appended with a comments section about the objects that has been steadily enhanced. The abbreviation for the catalog as a whole is BS or YBS but all citations of stars it indexes use HR before the catalog number, a homage to the catalog's direct predecessor, published in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Harvard Computers
The Harvard Computers were a team of women working as skilled workers to process astronomical data at the Harvard College Observatory in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. The team was directed by Edward Charles Pickering (1877 to 1919) and, following his death in 1919, by Annie Jump Cannon. Other computers on the team included Mary Anna Draper, Williamina Fleming, Anna Winlock, and Florence Cushman. Although these women started primarily as calculators, they made significant contributions to astronomy, much of which they published in research articles. History In the 19th century, the Harvard College Observatory faced the challenge of working through an overwhelming amount of astronomical data due to improvements in photographic technology. Harvard Observatory's director, Edward Charles Pickering, hired a group of women to analyze the astronomical data recorded on the growing Harvard Plate Stacks, collection of plate negatives. While Pickering was the director of the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Stellar Classification
In astronomy, stellar classification is the classification of stars based on their stellar spectrum, spectral characteristics. Electromagnetic radiation from the star is analyzed by splitting it with a Prism (optics), prism or diffraction grating into a spectrum exhibiting the Continuum (spectrum), rainbow of colors interspersed with spectral lines. Each line indicates a particular chemical element or molecule, with the line strength indicating the abundance of that element. The strengths of the different spectral lines vary mainly due to the temperature of the photosphere, although in some cases there are true abundance differences. The ''spectral class'' of a star is a short code primarily summarizing the ionization state, giving an objective measure of the photosphere's temperature. Most stars are currently classified under the Morgan–Keenan (MK) system using the letters ''O'', ''B'', ''A'', ''F'', ''G'', ''K'', and ''M'', a sequence from the hottest (''O'' type) to the cool ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Florence Cushman
Florence Cushman (1860–1940) was an American astronomer specializing in stellar classification at the Harvard College Observatory who worked on the ''Henry Draper Catalogue''. Life Florence was born in Boston, Massachusetts, and received her early education at Charlestown High School, where she graduated in 1877. In 1888, she began work at the Harvard College Observatory as an employee of Edward Pickering, observing and classifying stars. Florence was one of the "Harvard Computers" who worked under Pickering and, following his death in 1919, Annie Jump Cannon. Her classifications of stellar spectra contributed to ''Henry Draper Catalogue'' between 1918 and 1934. She stayed as an astronomer at the Observatory until 1937 and died January 30, 1940, at the age of 80. Career at the Harvard College Observatory Florence Cushman worked and was a member of the Harvard College Observatory from 1888 to 1937. She started her work by observing and classifying starts as one of Anni ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
