History of the Harvard College Observatory During the Period 1840-1890

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HISTORY OF THE HARVARD COLLEGE OBSERVATORY DURING THE PERIOD 1840–1890.

BY DANIEL W. BAKER.

Reprinted from the Boston Evening Traveller.

CAMBRIDGE. 1890.

PREFACE.

A careful study of the early history of the Harvard College Observatory has been made by Mr. DANIEL W. BAKER. Many facts were thus brought to light which had not appeared in print. A series of newspaper articles was accordingly prepared, which were published in the Boston “Evening Traveller” on six successive Saturdays, beginning August 2, 1890. Much of this material appearing to be of sufficient value for preservation in a more permanent form, it has been reprinted in the present pamphlet, with slight alterations, and with the addition of the illustrations given on page 25. The parts numbered IV. and V. originally appeared together as a single article. Reproductions have been made of some of the illustrations. The articles were originally addressed, not to professional astronomers, but to the general public, and are to be regarded as a popular description of the work accomplished at the Harvard College Observatory during the first fifty years of its existence.

EDWARD C. PICKERING.

HARVARD COLLEGE OBSERVATORY, September 13, 1890.

HISTORY OF THE HARVARD COLLEGE OBSERVATORY. 1840–1890.

The present is the semi-centennial year of the Harvard College Observatory. A precise date cannot be named for the beginning, but in the early months of the year 1840 the institution was gradually organized, and before midsummer became a tangible fact and a working adjunct of the college.

While the first astronomical observation is of record Dec. 31, 1839, it is well known that the observatory had not then an official staff, the appointment of the first director being of date Feb. 12, 1840, and the confirmation by the Board of Overseers somewhat later. Moreover, this particular observation and others immediately following were made in continuation of work begun elsewhere and not identified with the college affairs.

The advance made in astronomical science during the 50 years past is among the wonderful facts comprised in the record of the 19th century, and it is true that since it became fairly organized and equipped, Harvard College Observatory has been in the front rank in the march. A review of this progress so far as pertaining to the institution at Cambridge, is, therefore, timely. A history of 50 years, embodying so many facts of the first importance and interest as does this, cannot, even with the most resolute purpose as respects brevity, be disposed of in a single chapter. This, accordingly, will be the first of a series. The reader may be assured at the outset that the topics to be touched upon are various and in themselves attractive, and that, so far as possible, technicalities will be shunned.

Regarding the period of beginning just referred to as the blossoming, whence has followed abundant fruitage, it may be remarked that a long time passed between the budding and the blossoming, and that indications of the flow of a vital current are recognizable at as remote a date as 1761. In that year the sloop owned by the province of Massachusetts was fitted out at public cost to convey Prof. John Winthrop and others connected with the college, provided with instruments belonging to the college, to Newfoundland, for observation of a transit of Venus. In 1780, notwithstanding the financial straits incident to the war, the commonwealth provided a small vessel of war, called a “galley,” to take Prof. Samuel Williams, of the college, and party to Penobscot to observe a total eclipse of the sun. The first definite record pointing to a college observatory is of date 1805, when John Lowell, the uncle of that John Lowell who founded the Lowell Institute, being in Paris, consulted with Delambre, an astronomer of note, and procured from him written instructions as to suitable buildings and instruments for an observatory. This document was sent to the college authorities at Cambridge. No official action followed. The next of record is that the college authorities in 1815 appointed a committee to consider and report upon an eligible plan for an observatory. This is supposed to have been the first corporate action taken in the United States, having such an object in view. The doings of this committee are notable in two particulars, at least. They brought into official relations with the college for the first time, the man who was destined to be the builder and organizer of the observatory, 25 years later, William Cranch Bond.

He was about to visit Europe and was appointed the agent of the college to obtain information as to the construction and instrumental equipment of the observatory at Greenwich, and to make such plans, drawings, etc., as would enable him or another to construct an astronomical observatory at Cambridge; also to ascertain from the makers the cost of certain principal instruments like those at Greenwich. He performed the service and reported in detail in the following year. That nothing practical came of it for a quarter of a century was not owing to the will, but comparatively speaking, to the poverty of the college.

This result followed, however,—and it may be reckoned the second notable circumstance—that, upon his return, Mr. Bond constructed the model of an astronomical dome, the operative plan of which was the same as that of the great dome, built in 1844, and which has been in satisfactory use at Cambridge to the present time. The chief peculiarity of its mechanism is in the method of rotation by means of smoothly-turned spheres of iron. The dome rests on these at equi-distant points, and, being set in motion by suitable gearing, the iron balls sustaining its weight roll along a level circular track of iron, the circumference of which is equal to that of the dome. The method was unlike that previously in use. It appears to have been original with Mr. Bond, as is perhaps evinced by a remark in his report for 1848 referring to the matter: “If carefully examined, it will be found that this arrangement is as perfect in theory as it is appropriate and convenient in practice.” Experience has shown that spheres of hard bronze are more serviceable than those of iron, and bronze is now used.

The record indicates that an observatory did not cease to be a coveted object at any time during the 25 years prior to 1840. Two antecedent events, in themselves of importance, combined to bring the long cherished project to a happy issue,—the accession of Josiah Quincy to the presidency of the college and the action of Congress in authorizing what came to be popularly known as the “Wilkes Exploring Expedition.” The purpose of the expedition in part was to establish the latitudes and longitudes of uncharted places in distant parts of the world where American commerce was extending, and in part to investigate natural phenomena, including the facts of terrestrial magnetism. Having, after much delay, got an adequate appropriation, the naval department employed the best available talent of the country for the conduct of the enterprise.

Mr. Bond was engaged to make at his private observatory in Dorchester, Mass., investigations to fix a zero of longitude, whence final reference to Greenwich might be had, and to make a continuous record of magnetic observations at Dorchester for comparison with like records obtained at distant points by the expedition itself. As preliminary to the latter work, Mr. Bond tested in an isolated observatory in Dorchester the magnetic instruments with which the expedition was to be equipped.

Mr. Bond’s talents were as well known at Cambridge as at Washington. What Mr. Quincy did in the premises can best be stated in his own words: “Early in the year 1839, the exploring expedition then being in the Southern ocean, it occurred to the president of the university that if Mr. Bond could be induced to transfer his residence and apparatus to Cambridge and pursue his observations there, under the auspices of the university, it would have an important influence in clearing the way for an establishment of an efficient observatory in connection with that seminary, by the increase of the apparatus at its command, by the interest which the observations making by Mr. Bond were calculated to excite, and, by drawing the attention of the citizens of Boston and its vicinity to the great inadequacy of the means possessed by the university for efficient astronomical observations, create a desire and a disposition to supply them.”

This proposition, Mr. Quincy says in another connection, he made without having consulted with the corporation. That body sanctioned his action by making a formal contract with Mr. Bond, of date Nov. 30, 1839, the agreement on Mr. Bond’s part being to make the transfer as proposed. Steps were at once taken by the college authorities to secure a subscription of $100 each from 30 different gentlemen, which sum was applied, under Mr. Bond’s direction, in alterations and additions to a dwelling house owned by the college and known as the “Dana house.” It still stands upon its original site at the junction of Quincy and Harvard streets, the lot being the southeast corner of what are distinctively called “the college grounds.”

The cupola which crowns the roof is a reminder and proof of a part of these alterations: for within it was set up one of the telescopes of the first college observatory, the cupola when constructed being suitably domed for the purpose. Something practical in astronomy had always been taught in the college course. In this way, or possibly by Mr. Bond himself, the position of Harvard Hall on the college grounds had been determined. Thus, in a paper published by him in 1833 in the Memoirs of the American Academy, he gives the position of his observatory in Dorchester as “0°-3′-15″ east of Harvard Hall in Cambridge.”

That the astronomical equipment possessed by the college before Mr. Bond’s coming did not amount to the beginning of a proper observatory, sufficiently appears by a contemporary letter of Prof. Joseph Lovering, written in response to an official inquiry. He says that the college had at the time “no instrument of much value for determining either time or position, and no place more convenient for using instruments than an open field, or a window which might accidentally open in the right direction.” He gives the inventory, comprising an astronomical clock, which, he says, cannot be relied on for accurate time; a small transit instrument, which at one time was loaned to Dr. Bowditch, but returned, he having found it of little value; two reflecting telescopes of three feet and two feet focal length; and a refractor of three feet focal, which three, he says, “answered decently well for showing the moon, Jupiter’s satellites, Saturn’s ring, etc., to the students, but were very imperfect for any nice observation.” These, with an astronomical quadrant and a common quadrant, complete the list. The list of instruments brought by Mr. Bond does not appear in the printed records, but in the paper above referred to he names his instruments used at Dorchester as a Gregorian reflector of 30 inches focus, equatorially mounted, an achromatic telescope of 40 inches focus, a Borda’s circle, a Ramsden’s sextant, and two transit clocks. The clocks he describes as “excellent,” and says that they had mercurial pendulums.