[Chaos-l] Who knew? NCs big astronomy splash in 1900

[BOBI GALLAGHER]

American Association of Physics Teachers
North Carolina Section
Fall 2006 Meeting at Elon University

Tom English, Guilford Technical Community College
1900 May 28:  the Day Wadesboro North Carolina was the Center of American 
Astrophysical Research

Abstract: The Solar Eclipse of 1900 May 28 provided a unique opportunity to 
mobilize American astronomers around a specific research effort.  A charter 
committee of the newly formed American Astronomical and Astro-physical 
Society (later to be called the AAS), chaired by Simon Newcomb, but run by 
George Ellery Hale, attempted to coordinate and standardize observing 
efforts for the eclipse.  The eclipse track crossed the southeastern U.S. 
from New Orleans to Norfolk, and observers were stationed all along the 
shadow path.  Astronomers were thickest on the ground, however, in 
Wadesboro, NC, with major expeditions fielded there from Princeton, Yerkes, 
the Smithsonian Institution, and the British Astronomical Association.  The 
Wadesboro expeditions represented a changing of the guard in American 
astrophysics.  Pioneers of the first generation of astrophysics in America, 
S. P. Langley and C. A. Young, brought large groups, and individuals who 
would influence American astronomy in the coming decades, such as Hale and 
Henry Norris Russell, were also there.  The presentation will give a who's-who 
of astronomers at Wadesboro, explain why that NC town was the station of 
choice, and outline the eclipse research efforts undertaken there.


> _______________________________________________
> Chaos-l mailing list
> Chaos-l at rtpnet.org
> http://rtpnet.org/mailman/listinfo/chaos-l