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Benjamin Apthorp Gould and the Founding of the Argentine National Observatory

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 December 2015

John E. Hodge
John E. Hodge*
Affiliation:
Greensboro College, Greensboro, North Carolina
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Extract

The nineteenth century witnessed the first major change in astronomy since the birth of the science in antiquity. With the exception, in the eighteenth century, of William Herschel's great work in the course of which he speculated on the origin, composition and shape of the universe itself, man's concern with the heavens had been limited to plotting and cataloguing the positions and the movements of the stars and planets. The entire history of astronomy had consisted of more and more accurate observations of the solar system and the stars within our own galaxy, although only the haziest notions of the shape and size of that “island universe” were entertained by thoughtful astronomers.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Americas , Volume 28 , Issue 2 , October 1971 , pp. 152 - 175
Copyright
Copyright © Academy of American Franciscan History 1971

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References

1 Gould made no apologies for being old fashioned. In a letter to the Board of Directors of the Benjamin Apthorp Gould Fund, established by herself with a gift of $20,000, his daughter stipulated among the six major requirements for recipients of awards that preference be given to “the astronomy of precision” rather than astrophysics because of her father’s “ strong feelings on the subject.” Typed undated copy, enclosed in Alice Bache Gould to Simon Newcomb, August 9, 1897; Newcomb MSS., Box 39; Library of Congress. All of the many letters from Gould to Newcomb cited in this paper are from this source.

2 Carl Friederich Gauss (1777–1885). For almost fifty years Director of the Göttingen Observatory. Astronomer and physicist, most famous for his work in pure mathematics.

3 Friederich Wilhelm Bessel (1784–1846). More than thirty years Director of the Königsberg Observatory. A giant among astronomers, his most notable accomplishment was the first definite detection of the parallax of a fixed star (61 Cygni/-1838), from which the distance could be obtained.

4 Johann Franz Encke (1791–1865). Primarily a mathematician, deduced in 1835 a solar parallax from which he obtained a distance of 95,370,000 miles to the sun, a figure which long remained the accepted one.

6 Friederich Wilhelm August Argelander (1799–1875). Bessel’s greatest pupil. After 1837 Professor of Astronomy at the University of Bonn till his death; compiler of the famous Bonner Durchmusterung (1852–1862) and the accompanying atlas (1863), containing over 324,000 stars.

6 For a brief description of Gould’s many and varied accomplishments see Dictionary of American Biography (New York, 1931), VII, 447–448. No attempt is made here to cover his activities other than those relating to his work in Argentina. For interesting insights into his personality by one of his most intimate friends see Newcomb, Simon, Reminiscences of an Astronomer (Boston and New York, 1903), 78–82.Google Scholar

7 de la Caille, Nicolas Louis, Astronomiae fundamenta novissimis soils et stellarum observationibus stabilita Lutetiae et in Africa ad Caput Bonae etc. (Paris, 1757).Google Scholar Also Carlier, C., ed., Journal historique du voyage fait au Cap de Bonne-Espérance par … l’Abbé de la Caille … précédé d’un discours sur la vie de l’auteur (Paris, 1763).Google Scholar An English edition of his work appeared with a preface by SirHerschel, John as A Catalogue of 9166 Stars in the Southern Hemisphere … Made at the Cape of Good Hope in the Years 1151 and 1152 etc. (London, 1847).Google Scholar

8 Sir Thomas Makdougall Brisbane began observations in Australia in 1822, completed by James Dunlop in 1826. The rough results were first presented to the Royal Society by Dunlop in 1826 for which he won the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society in 1827. Computations were made from these and the results formally published by Richardson, William of the Royal Observatory, Greenwich as a A Catalogue of 1385 Stars, Chiefly in the Southern Hemisphere; Prepared from Observations Made in 1822–26 at the Observatory at Paramatta etc. (London, 1835).Google Scholar A preliminary prospectus had been compiled from the same data by Carl Riimker of the Hamburg Observatory and published in 1832 in Hamburg.

9 Johnson, Manuel J., A Catalogue of 606 Principal Fixed Stars in the Southern Hemisphere, Deduced from Observations Made at the Observatory, St. Helena (London, 1835).Google Scholar

10 Taylor, Thomas Glanville, A General Catalogue of the Principal Fixed Stars, from Observations Made at the Hon. East India Company’s Observatory at Madras in the Years 1830–43 (Madras, 1844).Google Scholar

11 Lt. Gillis, James M., A Catalogue of 16,148 Southern Stars, Deduced by the United States Naval Observatory from the Zone Observations Made at Santiago de Chile … during the Years 1849 '50 '51 '52 (Washington, D.C, 1895).Google Scholar

12 SirWilliam Herschel, John Frederick, Results of Astronomical Observations, Made during the Years 1834–38 at the Cape of Good Hope etc. (London. 1847).Google Scholar A fascinating and accessible addition to the lore of Southern Hemisphere astronomy has just been made available. Evans, David S., et. al., eds., Herschel at the Cape Diaries and Correspondence of Sir John Herschel, 1834–38 (Austin and London, 1969).Google Scholar For a brief survey, including observers not mentioned in this paper see Clerke, Agnes M., “A Southern Observatory,” Contemporary Review, 4 (March 1889), 380–392.Google Scholar There was also a quaint little observatory in Rio de Janeiro which usually goes unnoticed. Founded in 1827, and after 1864 under the direction of the French astronomer and naturalist, Emmanuel Liais (1826–1900), it had published nothing. When his northbound steamer put into Rio for a few days, Gould was able to visit it and renew his acquaintance with Liais whom he had not seen since 1851. In a letter he described the observatory in detail and drew a plan of it. Gould to Newcomb, July 28, 1880.

18 Resultados del Observatorio Nacional Argentino (Buenos Aires, 1881), II, p. IVX. (Hereinafter cited as Resultados). He had hoped to make a special preliminary spectroscopic survey of the brighter stars and to study closely those which proved to be most peculiar. He had at his disposal various pieces of equipment by Rutherford, Huggins and Zöllner.

14 Formally published much later as “On the Reduction of Observations, with a Determination of the Position of the Pleiades, from Photographs by Mr. Rutherford,” Memoirs, National Academy of Science, IV, pt. 1 (1888). 173–190. Gould’s delight and boyish enthusiasm over this accomplishment are revealed in his correspondence. Gould to Newcomb, August 24, 1866. For the best synthesis of the state of astronomy in this period and the significance of Gould’s feat see Rousseau, Pierre, Man’s Conquest of the Stars (New York, 1961), 265–272.Google Scholar

15 Sarmiento had just met Gould the Previous week during a trip to New England. Sarmiento to Aurelia Vílez, October 15, 1865, printed in Bunkley, Allison William, ed., A Sarmiento Anthology (Princeton, 1948), 274–276.Google Scholar

16 Reception of Dr. Benjamin A. Gould by His Fellow Citizens of Boston and Vicinity, June 22, 1874 (Boston, 1874), 11; pamphlet containing an address by Gould to the citizens of Boston, describing the founding of the observatory, University of North Carolina Library. Only later did Gould admit that he had no concrete information on conditions in Córdoba which included hurricanes, dust storms, locusts, torrential rains and even earthquakes. Letter to the editor, Astronomische Nachrichten, LXXXXIII (1878), No. 2216.

17 Gould to Sarmiento, October 14, 1865; Sarmiento to Gould, October 16, printed in Sarmiento, Domingo Faustino, Obras completas (Buenos Aires, 1884–1903), 30, 179–182.Google Scholar

18 Sarmiento to Vélez Sarsfield, October 16, 1865, printed in ibid., 182–183.

19 Reception of Dr. Benjamin A. Gould etc., 12.

20 República Argentina. Congreso Nacional, Diario de sesiones de la cámara de senadores, May 5, 1869, 13. Item 17 of that budget of the Ministry of Justice, Religion and Public Instruction provided 31,980 pesos for the observatory, ibid., 979. Due to mistakes made by Argentine engineers in estimating construction costs in Córdoba on the basis of those in Buenos Aires this amount fell short and work had to be halted temporarily for lack of funds in 1871. An additional 5,000 pesos (Law No. 456) were voted to complete the construction, ibid., August 22, 1871, 125. Argentine monetary values are impossible to designate precisely in these formative years of the Argentine Republic, due to many kinds of money in circulation, the often disordered political and economic situation and the absence of real central banking and national currency. The first attempt to bring order out of this chaos was the Monetary Law of 1881 which fixed the peso at 24.89 grains gold or 385.8 grains silver, that is 0.965 United States gold dollars. In any case, this appropriation represented a huge outlay on the part of a poor government. The administration and most legislators were enthusiastic; some scepticism and xenophobia were manifested. See particularly Diario de sesiones de la cámara de diputados, September 1, 1870, 517–519.

21 Reception of Dr. Benjamin A. Gould etc., 13.

22 A meridian circle is a transit instrument, a telescope mounted on an axle suspended between two pillars. It can be moved vertically only; thus, once installed it can be elevated to any degree of declination from the nadir to the zenith, but it can never track a moving object or one which appears to move due to the revolution of the earth. Once a day objects at the declination to which the instrument is elevated will pass in transit across the lens, where in conjunction with a sidereal clock (see note 35), their right ascension (or position in the sky comparably to longitude, determined by the distance measured in sidereal time of the object from the equinox of a given year) will be noted. For the most precise and easily understood description of the construction, operation and purpose of such an instrument the author recommends Russell, Henry, et al., Astronomy (Boston, 1945), 1, 59–66.Google Scholar The house of A. Repsold of Hamburg was preeminent in the manufacture of these, and the one acquired for the Argentine government by Gould was a particularly fine one and was the pride of the observatory for many years. Gould describes it with loving care in RESULTADOS, II, pp. XVII-XVIII.

23 For details of his contribution and subsequent career see the author’s “ Juan M. Thome, Argentine Astronomer from the Quaker State,” Journal of Inter-American Studies and World Affairs, XIII (April 1971), 215–229.

24 In 1861 Gould had married Mary Apthorp Quincy, the daughter of Josiah Quincy. Her high intelligence, sympathy, cooperation and courage transformed Gould’s life and steeled him for every endeavor. Her private fortune provided him financial assistance which enabled him to continue his astronomical work at times when he would otherwise have had to forego them. She bore him five children and shared every privation and sacrifice which his long exile entailed.

25 Reception of Dr. Benjamin A. Gould etc., 14–15. Letter to the editor, American Journal of Science and Arts, Third series, I, (February 1871), 153–156. There are some minor discrepancies as to dates in Gould's own accounts. For Sarmiento’s letter of welcome, dated November 9 see Sarmiento, , Obras, 41, 33–34.Google Scholar

26 American Journal of Science and Arts, loc. cit.

27 Exactly 33.6 meters above the square at Córdoba, 1400 meters from it at 13 degrees south of west. It was 428.5 meters above sea level, 4h 16m 47s west longitude; 31 degrees 258 15.4” south latitude. Resultados, II, 2.

28 According to Gould, the observatory was situated on no less than 100 feet of clay, alternating with sand, and no rock was to be found in the immediate area. Gould to Newcomb, May 9, 1880. He referred to difficulties involved in establishing a scientific institution “where the most rudimentary ideas were generally wanting, and where there were no competent mechanics even for the most simple details of construction.” Astronomische Nachricbten, loc. cit.

29 Reception of Or. Benjamin A. Gould etc., 13.

30 Observatorio National Argentino, Informe annual de su Director. Córdoba, May 24, 1871, 4–12; in pamphlet containing similar messages for 1872 and 1873 (Buenos Aires, 1876), Library of Congress.

31 “ Equatorial ” refers to the mounting. This is the standard type mounting for all refracting telescopes with lenses above three or four inches. The Córdoba instrument consisted of a mounting by the celebrated firm of Alvan Clark and Sons of Cambridge, Mass., but did not have one of the peerless Clark lenses. It was equipped with an eleven inch (28.6 cm.) photographic lens figured by Lewis Morris Rutherford which he had used to take his remarkable shots of the Pleiades from which Gould’s first measurements had been made. Confusion and error regarding the Córdoba equipment (Encyclopedia articles and many printed inventories are often incorrect) seems to have arisen in part from the fact there were three objective lenses for the large telescope: a viewing lense, attributed by Gould to Henry Fitz, Sr. of New York; the original Rutherford photographic lens, broken in transit and replaced; and the third, the identical replacement figured by Henry Fitz, Jr. under the supervision of Rutherford. Gould seems to have been also mistaken in crediting his viewing lens to Fitz, Sr.; it appears to have been primarily the work of Rutherford. Resultados II, pp. XVI, LXIII (misprinted XLIII); Gould, Benjamin Apthorp, Córdoba Photographs (Lynn, Mass., 1897), 3–4 Google Scholar; and Deborah Jean Warner (Smithsonian Institution) to the author, July 9, 1969.

32 Observatorio Astronómico Argentino, Discursos sobre su inauguración verificada el 24 de octubre de 1871 (Buenos Aires, 1872), 9; pamphlet, Library of Congress. The reader’s attention is directed to some of the extremely interesting correspondence between Gould and Avellaneda during the period 1870–1879, recently unearthed and edited by Caillet-Bois, Ricardo R. in Boletín del Instituto de Historia Argentina “ Doctor Emilio Ravignani” (1969), 11, 259–270.Google Scholar

33 Resultados, II, pp. XII–XIII.

34 In spite of the great care exercised in the laying of a deep foundation of brick and cement over which were placed enormous slabs of limestone, the support of the two pillars of Argentine marble continued to shift and settle throughout Gould's stay, requiring constant adjusment, including the filing down of several millimeters of first one side and then the other of the two V beds in which the axle of the meridian circle rested. Nightly checks were necessary for minor adjustments, sometimes as many as four times. These and other instrumental difficulties involving the transit instrument are minutely detailed in ibid., pp. LII–LVIII.

35 Sidereal time used by astronomers measures a day in terms of the earth's rotation with respect to the stars. The day is divided into twenty four hours on the clock, although the sidereal day is almost four minutes shorter than a solar day. Details of the Córdoba clock and its shortcomings due to a misinterpretation of Gould's instructions to the manufacture can be found in ibid., pp. XXXVII-XXXVIII.

36 An instrument involving a paper covered drum, turning one revolution per minute, as a pen held in an armature is made to jerk at every beat of the pendulum of the clock mechanism. Thus the mark caused by the jerk represents a second. The observer, with his eye glued to the transit instrument, presses a key which breaks the current and causes a special jerk or mark at the instant the object he is viewing reaches a certain cross hair or wire on the reticle. The sheet preserves a record of the exact time or right ascension of the object, thus avoiding the added error possible in calling out to an assistant watching a clock, pen in hand, and obviates the need for the assistant altogether. It was essential to the kind of work Gould had in mind. For details, ibid., pp. XXVIII-XXXIX.

37 Gould devoted a fascinating chapter to this problem in Resultados, I, 13–20; also 3–7; 100–102.

38 Ibid., 6.

39 Not the least troublesome result was that stars whose right ascensions had been computed on the basis of the equinox of 1872, originally selected by Gould, were all recomputed for the equinox of 1875 in order to keep the work up to date. Ibid., 10.

40 Observatorio Nacional Argentino, Discursos sobre su inauguración etc., 18.

41 Reprinted as Atlas de la Uranometría Argentina que contiene las estrellas del hemisferio sud por el Observatorio Nacional de Córdoba (Buenos Aires, 1905). In the Atlas and the text the sky was divided into 166 constellations with their boundaries carefully explained. These comprised 10,650 stars of which 2,450 were less than the seventh magnitude, and only about one tenth of which were north of the equator. About 44,500 estimates had been made by the four observers as each star had been checked and counter-checked. The total number involved a large group of double stars and clusters not separable with binoculars. Declination was given to the nearest tenth of a second of a minute of arc, and right ascension to the nearest second of time from the mean equinox of 1875. Cross referencing with other catalogues was elaborate and included indications of coloring and degree of coloration, as well as which stars appeared as single but were really double, and a great deal of appended information on interesting individual stellar phenomena.

42 Gould to Edward C. Pickering, December 10, 1878; MS. Harvard College Observatory Archives, courtesy of Mrs. Lyle G. Boyd.

43 Gould to Newcomb, February 23, 1879; Resultados, I, p. IX.

44 Over twenty years later one of America’s most distinguished astronomers could refer to this as a work in which the stars were “ catalogued and mapped with a minuteness of detail exceeding anything yet done for the northern sky.” Newcomb, Simon, The Stars A Study of the Universe (New York, 1901), 7.Google Scholar The Uranometria Argentina earned for its compiler the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society in 1883. The reader's attention is directed to the address of the President of the James Stone, R.A.S., Edward, upon the presentation of the award. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society (February 1883), 43, 249–253.Google Scholar This address is of particular interest since Stone had been engaged in exactly the same kind of work and had recently published A Catalogue of 12,441 Stars for the Epoch ISSO, from Observations Made at the Royal Observatory, Cape of Good Hope during the Years 1871 to 1879 (London, 1881).

45 “On the Number and Distribution of the Bright Fixed Stars,” American Journal of Science and Arts (November 1874), Third series, VIII, 325–234.

46 For a detailed and documented history of astronomy in the last century which is of particular interest to the historian for the “feel” it gives of the state of the art on the eve of the twentieth century, the reader should consult Clerke, Agnes M., A Popular History of Astronomy in the Nineteenth Century (London, 1885).Google Scholar

47 Resultados, I, 355–383.

48 This phenomenon is now known as “ Gould's Belt.” For an up to date description of it and mention of the astronomers who have studied it see S. W. McCluskey, “Distribution of Common Stars in the Galactic Plane,” in Blaauw, Adriaan and Schmidt, Maarten, eds., Galactic Structure (Chicago, 1965), 5,8.Google Scholar

49 Gould to Newcomb, March 8, 1874.

50 Ibid., June 14 and July 28, 1880.

51 NA. Despatches from the United Ministers to Argentina, 1817–1906, XVIII, No. 73, Dexter E. Clapp to Robert C. Kirk, December 13, 1870, petition enclosed; Gould to Clauu, February 13, 1873, enclosed in XIX, No. 32. NA. Despatches from the United States Consuls in Córdoba, Argentina, 1871–1906. I, No. 4, B. W. Green to William Hunter, July 5, 1877; Thome to Robert Bacon, June 24, 1906, and enclosure, no number. A careful survey of the U. S. Diplomatic and Consular Despatches helps to trace the comings and goings of the staff but sheds no light on the activities of the American astronomers in Córdoba.

52 Observatorio Nacional Argentino, Zonas de exploración. Atlas. Conteniendo ¡os posiciones y brillantes de todas las estrellas fijas la decima magnitud … comprendidas entre 22 y 42 grados de declinación austral etc. (Córdoba, 1893).

53 Clerke, , A Popular History of Astronomy etc., 361.Google Scholar

54 For reference to still earlier photographs made at the U. S. Naval Observatory, see Asaph Hall to Seth Chandler, March 7, 1904, printed in Gingerich, Owen, “The Satellites of Mars: Prediction and Discovery,” Journal for the History of Astronomy, 1 (August 1970), 109–115.CrossRefGoogle Scholar It is possible that the 1875 photographs referred to by Hall in his letter were of such poor quality that the 1879 Córdoba plates represent the first successful photographs of Mars.

55 Gould to Newcomb, April 5, 1882.

56 The results of these labors appeared posthumously as Gould, Benjamin Apthorp, Córdoba Photographs (Lynn, Mass., 1897).Google Scholar

57 The organization of the Argentine Meteorological Office is a large topic on which the author is preparing a separate paper.

58 From the annual reports of the Minister of Public Instruction for 1871 and 1872. Avellaneda, Nicolás, Escritos y discursos (Buenos Aires, 1910), 8, 214; 261–267.Google Scholar

59 The observatory’s contributions consisted of lunar and stellar photographs described by Gould in Address of Professor Gould on Receiving Premiums from the Governor of the Province of Córdoba the Premiums Awarded at the Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia etc. (n. p., n. d.); pamphlet acquired by Boston Public Library, May 5, 1892.

60 Gould, , Córdoba Photographs, 5.Google Scholar

61 Gould to Newcomb, January 12, 1880. Earlier than that he had expressed similar sentiments to Edward Pickering in a letter of December 18, 1877 and thought it would be “necessary to endure for only a little while longer.” MS. Harvard College Observatory Archives.

62 Gould to Newcomb, January 30, 1884. Stevens who was in Gould’s words “ one of the finest and noblest young men I ever knew,” was killed by a flash of lightning in February before he could begin his trip. The tragedy crushed Gould as if he had lost a “younger brother or son.”

63 March 9, 1885. Minutes of the meeting and Sarmiento’s address are printed in Sarmiento, XXII, 278–289.

64 Minutes of the meeting were published as Addresses at the Complimentary Dinner to Dr. Benjamin Apthorp Gould. Hotel Vendôme, Boston, May 6, 1885 (Lynn, Mass., 1885); pamphlet, Library of Congress.

65 Gould to Newcomb, September 24, 1885.

66 Gould to Professor W. H. Collins, March 30, 1896; Charles Roberts Autograph Letters Collection, Haverford College Library. Gould's activities almost to the day of his death can be traced in letters to Newcomb of January 8, February 4, November 8 and 23, 1896. He died from a fall sustained Thanksgiving Day, 1896.

67 Astronomische Nachrichten, loc. cit.

68 Gould, , Córdoba Photographs, 11–31 Google Scholar lists each of the 1099 plates. A valuable summation is included, 531–533. Gould gave special praise to George E. Whitaker who had assisted in all aspects of the work with great skill and conscientiousness for ten years.

69 Ibid., 41.

70 Simon Newcomb “Aspects of American Astronomy,” address delivered at the University of Chicago in connection with the dedication of the Yerkes Observatory, October 22, 1897, Astrophysical Journal (1897), VI, 300.

71 For details see Kuiper, Gerard P. and Middlehurst, Barbara, eds., Telescopes (Chicago, 1960), Table 1, appendix.Google Scholar