Morning journal and courier., 1889-06-29
A USEFUL LIFE.


] Death of Maria Mitchell, the Noted
 Astronomer-sketch of Her Career. LYNN, Mass, June 28.-Maria Mitchell the 1 noted astronomer who died here to-day, and | who will be buried at Nantucket, was the daughter of Wm. Mitchell, well known as- tronomer of Nantucket, Mass. He was 8 bank cashier and studied astronomy from @ love of the science. Investigations in astron- omy and mathematics were the pastimes of his life. His daughter was born in Nantucket on August 1, 1918, and at the age of eleven years began to assist her father in his astro nomical work. She studied under her father and Charles Pierce and later became the lat ter's assistant in the Nantucket school. At the age of eighteen she was appointed libra
 rian of the Nantucket Athen@um, a place she filled for twenty years. All her spare time
 however, was spent in the study of the stars, and night after night it was not until they
 had ceased to twinkle that she sought her
 couch. She soon surpassed her father in the
 energy and zeal with which she prosecuted
 her work and especially her search for com
 cts. In 1S47 her efforts were rewarded
 and she at once became famous. On Octo-
 Der 1 of that year, besides finding small
 nebulae, she discovered @ comet, and at oncc
 all the older astronomers of the world were
 interested in her. For her discovery of the
 comet the King of Denmark sent her gold
 struck by the Republic of San Marine, Italy.
 Soon afterwards she was employed at some
 work on the American Nautical Almanac,
 which she continued until her appointment
 in 1865 as professor of astronomy at Vassar
 on the founding of that institution. In
 1858 Miss Mitchell visited Europe and
 inspected the principal observatories of
 Great Britain and the continent She
 was the honored guest of Herschel. and of
 Sir George B. Airy, then the British astrono-
 mer royal at Greenwich. She was also the
 guest of Le yerrier in Paris ac1 Humboldt
 and received with high honors whe14 m went. On her return home Miss Mitchell
 was presented by the women of America
 with large telescope, a much larger one than any owned by her father.
 Miss Mitchell retained her professorship of astronomy at Vassar, as we'll as the post of director of the observatory until January, 1888, when she offered her resignation.
 Miss Mitchell was the first woman to be elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She always took prominent part in the movement to elevate woman's work. She presided at the meetings of the American association for the Advancement of Women at Syracuse in 1875 and at Phila- delphia in 1876. She was a member of var ious scientific societies: the American Asso citation for the Advancement of Science elected her member in 1850, and Fellow in 1874. In 1852 the degree of IL. D. was conferred on her by Hanover college and in ! 1887 by Columbia.
 Besides the first comet discovered by her in 1S47, Miss Mitchell found seven others, being in some cases in advance of other watchers by few days, and in others by few hours only. She was untiring in her work, and it is said that she did not marry in order that she might prosecute it with ! greater vigilance.
 At the age of eleven she recorded the l time of the beginning and the ending of I lunar eclipse, her father making l the observation through the tele- scope while she did duty at the I chronometer. Just ffty-four years later l there was 8 similar eclipse, when she again | took the time by her chronometer while her | pupils took her fathers place at the glass.
 In appearance Miss Mitchell was tall and \ angular. She was of rugged nature and strong physically we'll as intellectually. She dressed quietly and somewhat after the Quaker fashion. While not popular with the \ Vassar students in the general sense, they re- speoted her, and 1t may be said reverenced