Photography and the Long-Focus Visual Refractor: Three American Case Studies,1885–1914

Hollis H. P. , “Large telescopes”, The observatory, xxxvii (1914), 245–52, pp. 248–9. I have not included the 125-cm instrument exhibited at the Paris Exhibition of 1900, since it was never used for serious research.

Keeler James E. , “On a lens for adapting a visually corrected refracting telescope to photographic observations with the spectroscope”, The astrophysical journal, i (1895), 101–11, p. 101. See also by Keeler an additional note, “Photographic correcting lens for visual telescopes”, ibid., 350.

The standard history remains King Henry C. , The history of the telescope (London and Cambridge, Mass., 1955). However, this study must be supplemented. See for example Osterbrock Donald E. , “The quest for more photons—how reflectors supplanted refractors as the monster telescopes of the future”, presented to the Historical Astronomy Division of the American Astronomical Society, 161st Meeting, Boston, January 1983.

See for example Jones Zaban Bessie and Boyd Gifford Lyle , The Harvard College Observatory: The first four directorships, 1839–1919 (Cambridge, Mass., 1971), esp. chs 5–8. I have provided a synoptic discussion in “The development of astronomical photography to 1920”, to be published as ch. 2 of vol. iv A of the General history of astronomy by Cambridge University Press in 1983.

Holden Edward S. , “Stellar photography”, The overland monthly (2nd ser., xi, 1888), 587–90, p. 589.

The best general introduction is Scheiner J. , Die Photographie der Gestirne (Leipzig, 1897), 23–54. N. von Konkoly's chapter on “Astrophotographie” in Valentiner W. (ed.), Handworterbuch der Astronomie (Breslau, 1897), 212–304, contains a number of useful illustrations. A good discussion of the method of figuring and carefully separating the elements of an objective until the photographic focus is located can be found in Cornu M. A. , “Note sur la transformation de l'achromatisme optique des objectifs en achromatisme photographique. Note presentée à la Commission du passage de Vénus, dans sa séance du 25 janvier 1873”, Recueil de Mémoires, Rapports et Documents relatifs à l'observation du Passage de Vénus sur le Soleil, i, pt 2 (Paris, 1876), 265–70. A useful drawing and brief discussion of this method in use is found in ibid., Supplement to vol. i, pt 2, 110. The photovisual objective is discussed by De la Rue Warren , “Report on the present state of celestial photography in England”, Report of the twenty-ninth meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science (London, 1860), 130–53, p. 150. On the spectroscopic method of testing photographic objectives see Rutherfurd Lewis M. , “Astronomical photography”, American journal of science, xxxix (1865), 304–9.

Clarks to Floyd , 5 May 1886; Clarks to Holden , 7 June, 12 August 1886 (Lick Observatory Archives, McHenry Library, University of California-Santa Cruz (hereafter cited as LOA)).

Clarks to Floyd , 8 February 1887; Mantois to Clarks , 22 February 1887 (LOA).

Clarks to Floyd , 8 February, 22 February, 2 April 1887 (LOA).

Floyd to Clarks , 7 April 1887; Clarks to Floyd , 1 May 1887 (LOA).

Floyd to Plumb C. M. , 13 May 1887 (LOA).

Mantois to Clark , 15 June 1887; Clarks to Floyd , 14 July 1887; Clark A. G. to Clark George B. , 13 August 1887; telegram from Clark George B. to Floyd , 20 August 1887; Clark A. G. to Floyd , 1 September 1887; Clarks to Floyd , 9 September 1887 (LOA).

Telegram from Clarks to Floyd , 4 October 1887 (LOA).

Schönewald to Mathews H. E. , 10 June 1887 (LOA). For examples of Floyd's increasingly panicky behaviour see Floyd to Mastick , 1 June, 6 June 1887; Floyd to Clarks , 3 June 1887; Floyd to Secretary of the University of California, 8 June 1887 (LOA).

Relations between the two must be inferred from available evidence. See Holden to Floyd , 22 January, 5 February 1888; Holden's comments to S. W. Burnham are also interesting, 6 February 1888 (LOA). Apparently Floyd did not commit his side of the relationship to paper.

Floyd to Mathews , 30 November 1887 (LOA).

Floyd to Holden , 6 December 1887 (LOA).

Floyd , “Notes L.O.”, 2 January 1888 (LOA).

Floyd to Mathews , 14 January 1888 (LOA).

Floyd to Mastick , 19 December 1887 (LOA).

Ibid.

A rare contemporary interview with members of the Clark firm discusses testing photographic objectives. See “The Alvan Clark establishment”, Scientific American, lvii (1887), 198–9.

Floyd to Mathews , 29 December 1887 (LOA).

Floyd to Mathews , 4 January 1888 (LOA).

Floyd , “Notes L.O.”, 3 January 1888 (LOA).

Keeler to Holden , 3 January, 6 January 1888 (LOA).

Clarks to Floyd , 5 March, ? April 1886; Keeler to Holden , 6 January 1888 (LOA).

Floyd to Mathews , 7 January 1888 (LOA).

The leaves of Captain Floyd's desk calendar were carefully preserved and are among his papers in the LOA. They are an invaluable source of information for these critical days.

Keeler to Holden , 14 January 1888 (LOA).

Floyd's desk calendar, 30 January, 2 February 1888 (LOA).

Floyd to Holden , 14 January, 26 January 1888 (LOA).

Keeler to Holden , 2 February 1888 (LOA).

Floyd's desk calendar, 3 February 1888 (LOA).

These data were compiled from the catalogue which makes up part 2 of Deborah Jean Warner's study, Alvan Clark & Sons: Artists in optics (Washington, D.C., 1968), 39–112.

Publications of the Lick Observatory of the University of California (hereafter cited as PLO), iii (Sacramento, 1894), 2.

Floyd to Mastick , 21 February 1888 (LOA).

PLO, iii (1894), 2.

Holden to Floyd , 22 January 1888 (LOA).

Holden to Floyd , 5 February 1888 (LOA).

Holden to Burnham , 6 February 1888 (LOA).

PLO, iii (1894), 3.

Clark to Holden , 24 August 1896 (LOA).

Hale to Goodwin Harry , 17 July 1892 (microfilm copy, Hale-Goodwin letters, Neils Bohr Library, American Institute of Physics). Hale's thesis, “Photography of the solar prominences”, is published in Wright Helen (eds)., The legacy of George Ellery Hale (Cambridge, Mass., 1972), 117–39.

The astrophysical journal, i (1895), 180–8. See also Keeler J. E. , “Review of observatory atlas of the Moon”, ibid., v (1897), 150–2. Holden promised a great deal from the Lick instrument and made these promises in print. See, for example, “Stellar photography” (op. cit. (ref. 5)), 589–90. Thus the American and international astronomical communities were, perhaps, overly critical in their scrutiny. As Sir David Gill remarked in a letter to the historian Agnes Clerke, 18 September 1889, “Holden is attempting too many different things with the Lick telescope” he recommended the study of radial velocities by photography (reprinted in Forbes G. , David Gill: Man and astronomer (London, 1916), 373). From the beginning, lunar photography with the Lick telescope was a controversial matter. See Nielsen V. , “Photographs of the Moon”, The observatory, xii (1889), 76–77, or the comments of A. A. Common at a meeting of the RAS, ibid., xiii (1890), 69–70.

Barnard to Hale , 15 March 1895 (Director's Papers, Yerkes Observatory Library (hereafter cited as YOL)).

Hale to Mrs Hall, 12 July 1895 (YOL).

Ritchey G. W. , “Astronomical photography with the forty-inch refractor and the two-foot reflector of the Yerkes observatory”, Decennial publications of the University of Chicago, viii (Chicago, 1904), 389–97, p. 389.

Ritchey G. W. , “Celestial photography with the 40-inch visual telescope of the Yerkes observatory”, The astrophysical journal, xii (1900), 352–60, p. 353. For a brief review of earlier attempts along similar lines see Hale G. E. , “Report of the director of the Yerkes observatory for the period July 1, 1899–June 30, 1902” (Chicago, n.d.), 22.

Ritchey , “Celestial photography” (op. cit. (ref. 49)), 355. On the design of Common's double slide plateholder see Common A. A. , “On the construction of a five-foot equatorial reflecting telescope”, Memoirs of the Royal Astronomical Society, 1 (1892), 113–204, pp. 193–5.

Ritchey , “Astronomical photography with the forty-inch refractor and the two-foot reflector” (op. cit. (ref. 48)), 390.

Ritchey , “Celestial photography” (op. cit. (ref. 49)), 359.

For biographical information see Brouwer Dirk , “Biographical memoir of Frank Schlesinger, 1871–1943”, Biographical memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences, xxiv (1945), 105–44.

On F. L. O. Wadsworth's earlier career and difficult personality see Livingston Michelson Dorothy , The master of light: A biography of Albert A. Michelson (New York, 1973), esp. 188–90. On his difficulties with the Observatory Committee see Hale G. E. to Wadsworth , 29 May 1902, and Pickering E. C. to Wadsworth , 31 May 1902 (Allegheny Observatory Records, Archives of Industrial Society, Hillman Library, University of Pittsburgh (hereafter cited as AOR)). When he left Allegheny, Wadsworth gave up astronomy and entered private industry.

Schlesinger to Gill David , 29 May 1908 (AOR).

Schlesinger to Pickering E. C. , 12 April 1905 (AOR).

Schlesinger to Hastings C. S. , 14 April 1905 (AOR). In working with the collection at the Hillman Library I could generally only find letters from Schlesinger. In most cases it was not difficult to reconstruct the advice offered by his correspondents.

Schlesinger to Kapteyn J. C. , 28 May 1908 (AOR).

Schlesinger to Gill , 20 June 1908 (AOR).

See, for example, Schlesinger to Frost E. B. and Hale , 29 September 1908 (AOR).

Schlesinger to Boss Lewis , 8 October 1908 (AOR).

Schlesinger to Kapteyn , 25 January, 9 March 1909 (AOR).

The “failure” of the Potsdam photographic refractor had a decisive impact on the diffusion of photography in the international astronomical community. I am working on a paper dealing with the technical aspects of this episode.

Schlesinger to Wallace R. J. , 30 March 1909 (AOR).

See, for example, Schlesinger's letters to Seed, Lumiere Company of North America and Cramer Plate Company, 23 March 1909 (AOR).

“Report on the observatory, 1908–1909” (8 June 1909) (AOR).

Barnard to Schlesinger , 10 January 1912 (AOR). Barnard also indicated in a note at the top of the page that he had “written a letter of similar purport to Dr. Brashear”.

Schlesinger to Barnard , 12 January 1912 (AOR).

Schlesinger Frank , “Photographic determinations of the parallaxes of fifty stars with the Thaw refractor”, Publications of the Allegheny Observatory, iv (Lancaster, Penn., 1919), 3–9, p. 3. The guiding telescope is described on p. 4.

Schlesinger to Frost , 14 October 1914 (AOR).

Schlesinger's preliminary results using the Yerkes instrument were published in seven papers which appeared in vols xxxii-xxxiv of The astrophysical journal.