Thomas Wright (astronomer)

Thomas Wright (22 September 171125 February 1786) was an English astronomer, mathematician, instrument maker, architect and garden designer. He was the first to describe the shape of the Milky Way and to speculate that faint nebulæ were distant galaxies.

Early life

Wright was born at Byers Green in County Durham, being the third son of John and Margaret Wright of Pegg's Poole House. His father was a carpenter. He was educated at home as he suffered from speech impediment, and then at King James I Academy. In 1725 he entered into a clock-making apprenticeship to Bryan Stobart of Bishop Auckland, continuing to study on his own. He also took courses on mathematics and navigation at a free school in the parish of Gateshead founded by Dr Theophilus Pickering. Then he went to London to study mathematical instrument-making with Heath and Sisson, and made a trial sea voyage to Amsterdam.

In 1730, he set up a school in Sunderland, where he taught mathematics and navigation. He later moved back to London to work on a number of projects for his wealthy patrons. He travelled in 1746-7 to Ireland which resulted in a book, ''Louthiana'', with plans and engravings of the ancient monuments of County Louth, published in London in 1748. That was before he retired to County Durham and built a small observatory at Westerton.

Astronomy

Wright's publication ''An Original Theory or New Hypothesis of the Universe'' (1750) explained the appearance of the Milky Way as "an optical effect due to our immersion in what locally approximates to a flat layer of stars." This work influenced Immanuel Kant in writing his '' Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens'' (1755). The theory was later empirically advanced by William Herschel in 1785, leading to galactocentrism (a form of heliocentrism, with the Sun at the centre of the Milky Way). Another of Wright's ideas, which is also often attributed to Kant, was that many faint nebulæ are actually incredibly distant galaxies. Wright wrote:

Kant termed these "island universes." However "scientific arguments were marshalled against such a possibility," and this view was rejected by almost all scientists until 1924, when Edwin Hubble showed "spiral nebulæ" were distant galaxies by measuring Cepheids.

In his letters, Wright emphasised the possible enormity of the universe, and the tranquility of eternity:

Garden design

Wright has been credited with work for William Capel, 3rd Earl of Essex at Cassiobury Park in Watford, illustrating his designs in ''A Walk in Cassiobury Gardens'' and ''Views of Cassiobury''. In ''Grotesque Architecture'' of 1767 there is a design for a rockwork bridge to decorate "the fine piece of water" he had "with great pleasure seen... at Cassiobury", believed to be by Wright. A man of talents, he also gave the Earl's daughters mathematical instruction. Another patron was the Earl of Halifax, at Horton House.

In the 1750s, he laid out the grounds of Netheravon House, Wiltshire and after 1753, completed the design and construction of Horton Hall in Northamptonshire and gardens. He designed in 1769 the folly or eye-catcher known as Codger Fort at Rothley, Northumberland, on the Wallington Hall estate.

One of the largest existing examples of Wright's work is the Stoke Park Estate. The estate was remodelled by Wright between 1748 and 1766.

Death

Wright died in 1786 in Byers Green and was buried in the churchyard of St Andrew's, South Church, Bishop Auckland. He was survived by his illegitimate daughter.

References

Works

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Sources

*Eileen Harris, ed., ''Arbours and Grottos. A facsimile of the two parts of Universal Architecture, (1755 and 1758), with a catalogue of Wright's works in architecture and garden design'', London: Scolar Press, 1979.
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*Eileen Harris, 'The Print That Never Was: Thomas Wright's Unpublished ''Edinburgh Almanack'' for 1733', ''Print Quarterly'', vol. XXIX, no. 3, September 2012, pp. 280–288.

External links

* University of Glasgow Library, Special Collection

''Plate VIII from Wright's 'An Original Theory or New Hypothesis of the Universe…': 'a proportional Drawing of all the primary and secondary Planets together, distinguished by their Characters...'.''

Portrait of Thomas Wright from the Lick Observatory Records Digital Archive, UC Santa Cruz Library's Digital Collections

{{DEFAULTSORT:Wright, Thomas
1711 births
1786 deaths
18th-century English astronomers
Scientists from County Durham
English scientific instrument makers
Freemasons of the Premier Grand Lodge of England
People from Byers Green