American eclipse
Subtitle: a nation's epic race to catch the shadow of the moon and win the glory of the world
By: David Baron
Edition: First edition.
Publisher: Liveright; Liveright Publishing Corporation, a division of W.W. Norton & Company
Published: 2017
Language: eng
Number of pages: 330
ISBN-13: 9781631490163
Subjects: Science; Eclipses; Civilization; Astronomy; History
Description: In vibrant historical detail, American Eclipse animates the fierce jockeying that came to dominate late nineteenth-century American astronomy, revealing the challenges faced by three of the most determined eclipse chasers who participated in this adventure. James Craig Watson, in his day a renowned asteroid hunter; Vassar astronomer Maria Mitchell, who fought to demonstrate that science and higher learning were not anathema to femininity; and Thomas Edison, a young inventor and irrepressible showman. With vivid accounts of train robberies and Indian skirmishes, Baron's page-turning drama not only brings to life the mythologized age of the Wild West in a totally unexpected way but forever memorializes an historic eclipse that would come to symbolize American science in its ascendance.--
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (pages [289]-308) and index.
Table of contents: title: Prologue: Shall the sun be darkened; title: Part one: 1876. Reign of shoddy; title: Professor of quadruplicity; title: Nemesis; title: "Petticoat parliament"; title: Part two: 1878. Politics and moonshine; title: The wizard in Washington; title: Sic transit; title: "Good woman that she are"; title: Show business; title: Part three: 1878. Among the tribes of uncivilization; title: Queen city; title: Nature's editor; title: Old probabilities; title: Part four: 1878. Favored mortals; title: First contact; title: Totality; title: American genius; title: Part five: 1878-1931. Ghosts; title: Shadow and light; title: Epilogue: Tendrils of history.