Evening journal., 1888-07-07

purely by subscription.
.s#
Previous to the year 1S42 there was no
observatory in the United States built
and equipped on the scale Of those in
Europa The largest telescope in America
was at the Philadelphia high school, its
focal length being only eight feet There
were few such Instruments In different
places and some Of their receptacles were
called observatories, but no regularly
built and equipped observatory existed
within the limits of the United States up
to the date named.
The first real observatory in America
furnished with first class instruments was
built by subscription. O. NJ Mitchell, q
professor in a small college at Cincinnati
afterwards a general in the Union army
while lecturing on astronomy, became in
terested and succeeded in deeply inter
esting others in this ahstruse science. He
framed a resolution to build by subscrip-
tion organizing a stock association, tho
shares Of which he placed at a par value
Of SOD an observatory like those then
in use abroad, and to furnish it with first
class instruments. The result Of his
efforts was the first of our great observa-
tories. The old Cincinnati observatory
has since been abandoned and a building
placed in another location ia the same
city; but the equatorial brought over
from Europe by Mitchell, In 1SA5. is still
in use in the new building. The object
glass of this telescope, which was a re-
tractor, as are all our telescopes in this
country, is II inches in diameter.
-
The impetus given by Mitchell gave rise
to number of observatories, one Of
which, the Naval observatory at Wash
ington, instituted by the United States
government as a depot for charts and
instruments" followed very soon after
As early as 1888, Lieut.. Gillis, Of the
navy, used little transit and began to
make number Of observations. IN 1914.
Gillis, who had charge of the work Of
building the naval observatory which had
been authorized by congress simply as a
repository of instruments, from the
fact that an observatory would meet with
ridicule in that unenlightened dav. com.
pleted the central portion Of the building.
But it was not till some time after that
the equatorial was mounted Other gov
ernment observatories, those at West
Point and Annapolis, soon followed.
John Quincy Adams had, ia 1925, tried
to induce the government to erect an
observatory, but his proposition had only
met with contempt. He took an interest,
however, in an embryo observatory in
Cambridge and delivered the Grafton at
the laying of the corner stone Of the one
at Cincinnati The Cambridge building
was completed in 1914, but the refractor
TO be placed in it did not arrive till 1s47.
Professor w. O. Bond was its director.
Mitchell, at Cincinnati; Gillis, at Wash
ington, and Bond, at Cambridge, were the
first three directors of observatories in
the United States.
The observatory at Dartmouth college
came next, but this was not till 1853.
The citizens Of Albany, N. ", had mean
while made move to establish an observ-
atory in that city, and Mrs. Blandina
Dudley had signihed willingness to give
the means, provided the institution could
be made a memorial to her deceased hus-
band and named for him. In 1851 Pro
fessor Mitchell, having been persuaded to
take an interest in it, drew the plans; the
structure was erected, the instruments
were procured, and in 1860 Mitchell ac-
cepted the dictatorship. Hamilton col
lege, Ann Arbox and Yale followed at
intervals, and within twenty years after
the arrival of the Cincinnati refractor a
number of frst class observatories and
many fne instruments were in operation
in different parts Of the United States.