George Bassett Clark (February 14, 1827 – December 20, 1891) was an American instrument maker and

astronomer An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. Astronomers observe astronomical objects, such as stars, planets, natural satellite, moons, comets and galaxy, galax ...

. Born in

Lowell, Massachusetts Lowell () is a city in Massachusetts, United States. Alongside Cambridge, Massachusetts, Cambridge, it is one of two traditional county seat, seats of Middlesex County, Massachusetts, Middlesex County. With an estimated population of 115,554 in ...

and educated at Phillips Academy, Andover, he was the son of

Alvan Clark Alvan Clark (March 8, 1804 – August 19, 1887) was an American astronomer and telescope maker. Biography Born in Ashfield, Massachusetts, Clark started as a portrait painter and engraver (c.1830s–1850s), and at the age of 40 became involved ...

, part of a family of

refracting telescope A refracting telescope (also called a refractor) is a type of optical telescope that uses a lens (optics), lens as its objective (optics), objective to form an image (also referred to a dioptrics, dioptric telescope). The refracting telescope d ...

makers in the 19th century. In 1846, George Bassett Clark joined his father and brother at the family's telescope works in

Cambridge, Massachusetts Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. It is a suburb in the Greater Boston metropolitan area, located directly across the Charles River from Boston. The city's population as of the 2020 United States census, ...

. The firm,

Alvan Clark & Sons Alvan Clark & Sons was an American maker of optics that became famous for crafting lenses for some of the largest refracting telescopes of the 19th and early 20th centuries. Founded in 1846 in Cambridgeport, Massachusetts, by Alvan Clark (1804& ...

, made many of the record-breaking refracting instruments, including the still-largest refracting telescope at the

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 until 2018. O ...

, gaining "worldwide fame and distribution", wrote one author on astronomy in 1899. Clark was elected a Fellow of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (The Academy) 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, and other ...

in 1878.

References

External links

Portraits of George Bassett Clark from the Lick Observatory Records Digital Archive, UC Santa Cruz Library's Digital Collections
1827 births 1891 deaths Phillips Academy alumni American astronomers Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences People from Lowell, Massachusetts Astronomical instrument makers {{US-astronomer-stub

See also

References

External links