Edward Charles Pickering
| Edward Charles Pickering | |
|---|---|
 Edward Charles Pickering
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| Born | July 19, 1846 Boston, Massachusetts |
| Died | February 3, 1919 (aged 72) Cambridge, Massachusetts |
| Nationality | American |
| Fields | astronomy |
| Known for | spectroscopic binary stars |
| Notable awards | Henry Draper Medal (1888) Bruce Medal (1908) |
Edward Charles Pickering (July 19, 1846–February 3, 1919) was an American astronomer and physicist, brother of William Henry Pickering.
Along with Carl Vogel, Pickering discovered the first spectroscopic binary stars. He wrote Elements of Physical Manipulations (2 vol., 1873–76).
Pickering attended Boston Latin School, and received his B.S. from Harvard in 1865. Later, he served as director of Harvard College Observatory from 1877 to his death in 1919, where he made great leaps forward in the gathering of stellar spectra through the use of photography.
At Harvard, he recruited many women to work for him, including Annie Jump Cannon, Henrietta Swan Leavitt, and Antonia Maury. These women, who came to be known as "Pickering's Harem" by the scientific community, made several important discoveries at HCO. Leavitt's discovery of the period-luminosity relationship for Cepheids, published by Pickering,[1] would prove the foundation for the modern understanding of cosmological distances.
In 1876 he co-founded the Appalachian Mountain Club.
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[edit] Honors
Awards and honors
- Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1867.[2]
- Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society (1886 and 1901)
- Henry Draper Medal from the National Academy of Sciences (1888)[3]
- Bruce Medal (1908)
Named after him
- The crater Pickering on the Moon
- The crater Pickering Mars.
- Asteroid 784 Pickeringia
(all jointly named after him and his brother William Henry Pickering)
[edit] Publications
- Pickering, EC (1912). "THE ALLEGHENY OBSERVATORY IN ITS RELATION TO ASTRONOMY.". Science 36 (927): pp. 417–421. 1912 Oct 4. Bibcode 1912Sci....36..417P. doi:10.1126/science.36.927.417. PMID 17788756
[edit] References
- ^ Miss Leavitt in Pickering, Edward C. "Periods of 25 Variable Stars in the Small Magellanic Cloud" Harvard College Observatory Circular 173 (1912) 1-3.
- ^ "Book of Members, 1780-2010: Chapter P". American Academy of Arts and Sciences. http://www.amacad.org/publications/BookofMembers/ChapterP.pdf. Retrieved 7 April 2011.
- ^ "Henry Draper Medal". National Academy of Sciences. http://www.nasonline.org/site/PageServer?pagename=AWARDS_draper. Retrieved 19 February 2011.
[edit] External links
[edit] Obituaries
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- 1846 births
- 1919 deaths
- Astronomers
- Harvard University alumni
- Harvard Computers
- Harvard University staff
- American astronomers
- Boston Latin School alumni
- Recipients of the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society
- National Academy of Sciences laureates
- Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
- Recipients of the Bruce Medal
- American astronomer stubs
