E. P. Fedorov as President of Commission 19 of IAU During the Period of the Reorganization of ILS

Extract

Evgeniy Pavlovich Fedorov (1909–1986) was President of Commission 19 of the IAU in 1955–1961. In this period the future of the ILS was discussed very actively and the plan for future study of the polar motion was elaborated. E. Fedorov was the organizer and the leader of these preparatory works.

He was editor of the collection of papers “On the present state and the future of latitude investigations” (1960, Moscow). In this collection well-known scientists discussed their opinions on the state latitude observations and their improvement. Among them where: H. Spencer Jones, P. Melchior, T. Hattori, I. Fleckenstein, N. Sekiguchi, W. Munk, R. Vicente, A. Young, E. Fedorov, M. Torao, N. Stoyko. In that time Fedorov wrote on the problem of the ILS. The inception of the ILS was preceded by a period of thorough discussion of various aspects of latitude work. By the end of the 19th century polar motion had become a problem of vital importance in astronomy and geophysics. Many efforts were made at that time to find the best means for obtaining the most accurate polar coordinates. As a result a plan of international cooperation for the study of polar motion was worked out.