Solar Spectrum
date: label: date made
content: 1875
name: label: maker
content: Rutherfurd, Lewis Morris
notes: label: Description
content: The text below the image reads: “SOLAR SPECTRUM. / FROM NEGATIVES MADE WITH AN INTERFERENCE GRATING BY LEWIS M. RUTHERFURD, NEW YORK, 1875 / PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY OSCAR G. MASON, NEW YORK, U. S. A.”
label: Description
content: Lewis Morris Rutherfurd (1816-1892) was a New York lawyer and accomplished amateur astronomer who, at a meeting of the Royal Astronomical Society in London in May 1878, exhibited “a gigantic photograph of the solar spectrum some 10 ft. in length with innumerable sharply defined lines.” This is an example of that photograph. It was taken with a diffraction grating ruled upon speculum metal, with upwards of 17,000 lines to the inch. Rutherfurd explained that “the photographs had been taken in some 8 or 10 sections, and that very different exposures were necessary for different parts of the spectrum.” The complete image, which covered the second order spectrum from below E in the green to the ultraviolet, was a composite of 28 separate photographs taken with different exposures.
label: Description
content: Ref: Notice of Royal Astronomical Society meeting in <i>English Mechanic</i> 27 (1878-1879): 262.
label: Description
content: Deborah Jean Warner, “Lewis M. Rutherfurd: Pioneer Astronomical Photographer and Spectroscopist,” <i>Technology and Culture</i> 12 (1971): 190-216.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United States: New York, New York
topic: label: Subject
content: Science
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Physical Sciences
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Princeton University
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: PH.333934
label: catalog number
content: 333934
label: accession number
content: 299612
objectType: label: Object Name
content: Photograph of the Solar Spectrum
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: paper (overall material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 21 cm x 3.5 m x 2.5 cm; 8 9/32 in x 11 15/32 ft x 31/32 in
label: Measurements
content: overall: 13 in x 142 1/2 in x 4 1/2 in; 33.02 cm x 361.95 cm x 11.43 cm