 asaph hall iii (october 15, 1829 &ndash; november 22, 1907) was an american astronomer who is most famous for having discovered the moons of mars, deimos and phobos, in 1877. he determined the orbits of satellites of other planets and of double stars, the rotation of saturn, and the mass of mars. ==life== hall was born in goshen, connecticut, the son of asaph hall ii (1800â42), a clockmaker, and hannah palmer (1804â80). his paternal grandfather asaph hall i (june 11, 1735 â mar. 29, 1800) was a revolutionary war officer and connecticut state legislator.connecticut revolutionary war lists, 1775â1783. p. 20.heads of families at the first u.s. census. ct. by u.s. bureau of the census. washington, 1908. (227p.): 45 record of conn. men in mil. and naval service during the rev. war, 1775â1783. by henry p.johnston. hartford. 1889. (17,779p.): 61, 424, 548 his father died when he was 13, leaving the family in financial difficulty, so hall left school at 16 to become an apprentice to a carpenter. he later enrolled at the central college in mcgrawville, new york, where he studied mathematics. there he took classes from an instructor of geometry and german, angeline stickney. in 1856 they married. in 1856, hall took a job at the harvard college observatory in cambridge, massachusetts, and turned out to be an expert computer of orbits. hall became assistant astronomer at the us naval observatory in washington dc in 1862, and within a year of his arrival he was made professor. in 1875 hall was given responsibility for the usno 26-inch (66-cm) telescope, the largest refracting telescope in the world at the time. it was with this telescope that he discovered phobos and deimos in august 1877. hall also noticed a white spot on saturn which he used as a marker to ascertain the 
1829_births 1907_deaths American_astronomers Chevaliers_of_the_LA(c)gion_d\'honneur Discoverers_of_moons Harvard_University_staff People_from_Litchfield_County,_Connecticut Recipients_of_the_Gold_Medal_of_the_Royal_Astronomical_Society