Many thanks to all the people who look at my blogs.
Just to let everyone know that I am back off on another rambling astronomer mission to the gamma quadrant, this means that there will be no blogs until Friday November 14th 2025
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Nature July 3rd 1873
We learn that there has been erected a small observatory on
the Columbia (U.S.) College campus for educational and we hope, also for
scientific purposes. The observatory is furnished with an equatorial, accompanied
by a seven prism spectroscope by Clark, and a position micrometer, besides an
altazimuth and a zenith telescope.
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The great comet of 1882 was first seen in September of that year and was observed and photographed by astronomers all around the world. This included from India.
On September 25th 1882 H Collett from Lahore, the
Punjab, India observed the comet with a 4.5 inch Cooke telescope. At 04 hours
and 50 minutes local time the comet was estimated to be about 14 degrees long
and of unusual breadth. The borders of the tail appear much brighter that the
central part.
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Cooke Instruments were of the highest quality but by the 1920s with a slump in trade around the world for optical instruments Cooke’s were now discovering the penalty of making instruments too well, they did not need repairing!
The campaign was not just in the UK it was also global, and
senior salesmen were sent to the various Cooke offices around the world to try
to drum up extra business. It worked briefly but sadly for Cookes and other
major industries around the world the Great Wall Street Crash in 1929 signalled
the beginning of the Great Depression in the 1930s and the demand for optical
instruments ceased almost overnight.
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Astronomical Register February 1865
Sir,- Some of your correspondents have asked for a diagram for the stars near the planet Uranus is at presented situated, I herewith send you one, which I trust will meet the requirements of amateurs.
To find Uranus.- With the naked eye direct your attention to
the constellations Taurus and Gemini. Having noted the stars beta and zeta at
the tips of the bull’s horns, and mu, nu and gamma at the feet of the twins,
proceed (see diagram) along an imaginary line for my Gemini toward beta Taurus,
passing by eta Gemini 4th mag. To No.1 Gemini full 5th
mag. Between this latter star and beta Taurus will be perceived a triangle of 5th
mag stars, viz: 132, 136 and 139 Taurus. Now the planet Uranus will be found situated
a little below a line drawn from 1 Gemini to 132 Taurus, the lowest of the
triangle.
Uranus being generally invisible to the naked eye, the telescope must be pointed towards the place indicated in order to see it. Perhaps on first trial it will not be easily found and the star 132 will be in the field; if so this will be readily known by its having a small 7th mag star near to it. Before leaving this star note well its apparent brightness, for Uranus is not quite so bright, and can easily be found by pointing the telescope a little s.f.
Having got Uranus in the field, unless you have a large and good telescope, you will only see a dull looking object, and will not be able satisfactory to make out its disc. If now you show it to some of your friends not versed in planetary lore, you will most likely be greeted with “Oh! Is that all?” and excite feelings, if not expressions of scepticism as to its being a planet.
Unless possessed of a large telescope, the best way of
observing Uranus is to use, not a telescope, but far better, a binocular opera
or field glass. With such an instrument, Uranus can be found and shown almost
instantly. Having other stars in the field at the same time with it, its planetary nature is made palpable in a week, by its varied its position with
regard to its neighbours.
I am, Sir your obedient servant, T M Simkiss
Waterloo Road Wolverhampton
January 16th 1865
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Nature, June 19th 1873
M Leverrier has entered on his new office of Director of the
French National Observatory. The Observatory Board has decided on his formal
proposition that they shall co-operate with the Bureau des Longitudes for
taking a new measure of the French arc from Dunkerque to Oran via Spain.
Commander Perrier will be the chief geodesist for that most important survey.
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Join me, Martin Lunn MBE every Monday evening from 7.00 pm-9.00 pm on the award-winning Astronomy Show on Drystone Radio, probably the only regular astronomy show on any radio station in the country.
I will take my weekly look at the night sky and look at all
the latest news in astronomy. There will be the astronomical anniversaries this
week plus the latest news from the astronomical societies in the north of
England.
The Astronomy Show every Monday evening only on Drystone
Radio live online at www.drystoneradio.com
DAB radio in Bradford and East Lancashire, or 102 and 103.5 FM and can also be
heard later on the Drystone Radio Podcast.
On November 5th 1867 the 25 inch object glass which had been so long in the making by Thomas Cooke of York was completed. This was the largest object glass to that date. It was tested on the double star gamma 2 Andromeda and the stars were seen most distinctly divided and with the spurious disks of the three stars of the system perfectly round.
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On Saturday afternoon October 9th 1920 members of the Leeds Astronomical Society of which Mr David Booth is president and others visited the works of Messrs Cooke and Sons Ltd Bishophill, York where an interesting and instructive time was spent.
During their tour around the works they saw how lens are ground down and polished and how various instruments are used and adjusted.
Among the other things pointed out were various parts of the 18 inch telescope for Brazil. In the show room there were various telescopes including one made by Mr Cooke in 1850.
The visitors were surprised to find that in York there were
such large and extensive works equipped with the various modern and accurate
machines capable of making the most precise scientific instruments for the
exacting demands of today.
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Academy Newspaper Saturday 6th March 1880
Observations of Nebulae and Clusters of Stars made with the
Six-foot and Three-foot Reflectors at Birr Castle from the Year 1848 to about
the Year 1878. By the Earl of Rosse.
Parts I. and II. in vol. ii. of the Scientific Transactions
of the Royal Dublin Society, Lord Rosse has published the observations of
nebulae procured by means of the great telescopes of his observatory in the
course of thirty years.
The late Earl, the
constructor of these great instruments, had brought out several papers on a
selection of the nebulae and clusters observed, the last one having appeared in
the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society for 1861; but, with the
exception of a monograph on the great nebula in Orion, published in the
Philosophical Transactions for 1868, no further account of the observations had
been given, and it was time that astronomers should be put in possession of
whatever observations had been procured. It was obviously desirable that the
original notes of the observers should be pretty fully transcribed in order to
give due weight to their evidence. The brighter and more striking objects of
Sir John Herschel’s Catalogue of 1833 having been first examined, and the more
interesting ones having been ‘delineated in drawings published in the former
papers, there remained less scope for the pencil, and the micrometer has been
more frequently used instead. However, twenty-five nebulae or groups of nebulae
have been figured on four plates, and the new drawings of the crab-nebula
Messier 1, of G. C. 1,227 = H. V. 28, and of the spiral nebula Mess. 51, will
be considered especially interesting.
The absence of any indication of the places of the nebulae,
except in a limited number of cases, is a serious drawback, since it renders
constant reference to other publications necessary, and, indeed, gives to the
observations a merely supplementary character. It is acknowledged that some
difficulty has arisen now and then in regions rich in nebulae in identifying
the object observed with a catalogued nebula; but it is believed that very few
cases of uncertain identity remain. Into the text have been introduced
diagrams, which are rough copies of those drawn at the telescope, and which
will be useful in any re-examination, when they can be compared directly with
the heavens. In an Appendix some letters are printed in vindication of the
performance of the six-foot reflector, against some disparaging remarks which
have appeared in a magazine article. Astronomers, however, will probably be
guided in their judgment chiefly by the work which has actually been
accomplished. The present publication comprises the nebulae between Oh. and
14h. of right ascension; part iii. is intended to contain those within the last
ten hours.
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Nature, May 15th 1873
The Cincinnati Observatory founded by Prof. Mitchell, is we
learn, to be removed, and established in a manner worthy of the wealth of
Cincinnati. From the drawings it may be judged that the dome of the new building
will be thirty-five feet in diameter in the inside.
The new site was highly approved of by Prof Abbe, who
continued until lately to be the director of the observatory at Cincinnati, and
was presented by John Kilgour, Esq, who also added thereto the sum of ten
thousand dollars to provide for the new building.
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Nature, March 27th 1873
The largest catalogue of stars that has ever been published
in America is now about to appear from the United States Naval Observatory at
Washington.
This work, as far as we can learn from a recent communication
of Prof. Yarnall, will embody all the valuable observations made since the
foundation of the observatory in 1842, with the meridian instruments,
consisting of the work of the well-known astronomers Coffin, Hubbard, Ferguson,
Newcomb, Hall, Harkness and Yarnall.
Over fifteen years of labour have been devoted to it by Prof
Yarnall and his assistants, and he himself has made nearly one half of the
observations. The catalogue will be based on over eighty thousand observations
of more than ten thousand stars, many of them being quite faint, and in extreme
southern latitudes, such as have never or rarely hitherto been observed.
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On October 17th 1963 using the 6 inch Cooke telescope at x300 magnification at the Republic Observatory in Johannesburg, South Africa astronomers saw the Saturnian moon Iapteus occulted by Saturn. Iapetus was discovered by Cassini in 1671,
The first dimming occurred at 18h 58 m UT the light was finally extinguished at 19h 07m. These observations were confirmed by the Astronomical Observatory at Madrid.
The Union Observatory was originally the Meteorological Observatory built in 1905, it became the Union Observatory in 1912, until 1961 and finally the republic Observatory until it closed
Join me, Martin Lunn MBE every Monday evening from 7.00 pm-9.00 pm on the award-winning Astronomy Show on Drystone Radio, probably the only regular astronomy show on any radio station in the country.
I will take my weekly look at the night sky and look at all
the latest news in astronomy. There will be the astronomical anniversaries this
week plus the latest news from the astronomical societies in the north of
England.
The Astronomy Show every Monday evening only on Drystone
Radio live online at www.drystoneradio.com
DAB radio in Bradford and East Lancashire, or 102 and 103.5 FM and can also be
heard later on the Drystone Radio Podcast.
In the classic handbook of Descriptive Astronomy by G F Chanbers there are drawings from October 1865 showing a Great Sun Spot. The drawings were made by Frederick Brodie from his observatory at Uckfield in Sussex using an 8.5 inch Cooke
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Academy Newspaper Saturday August 17th 1878
The observers of the total eclipse of the sun on July 29, in
America, have been very much favoured by the weather, and the observations,
telescopic, spectroscopic, polariscopic, and photographic, seem to have highly
successful. The corona appeared small, but of great brightness, and photographs
of it and of its spectrum were obtained. Several long rays were seen, perhaps
even the zodiacal light, at a distance of six degrees from the sun. The few
prominences visible appeared insignificant and dim; the chromosphere rather
low. It is sufficient at present to know of the observers’ good fortune and to
await their full reports.
In the instructions
issued by the Washington Observatory for observing the eclipse, the importance
is pointed out of renewing during the totality the search for an
intra-Mercurial planet or planets, and a map is given showing all the stars to
the seventh magnitude in a space extending over 32° in right ascension, and 15°
in declination, with the sun in or near the centre. Of the observers on the
look-out only one, Prof. Watson, the experienced discoverer of so many small
planets, is reported to have succeeded in seeing a hitherto unknown star in
right ascension 8" 26™ and declination 18° 0’ or a little over two degrees
distant from the sun, and less than a degree from the place of the star
theta Cancri given in the map.
The news has been telegraphed to London, Paris, and Berlin;
but, oddly enough, the telegram in one, or more than one, instance, purports to
have been sent by the late secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, Joseph
Henry, who died in May last.
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October 22nd 1863
Turning my 6 inch Cooke telescope upon Venus I was much surprised to see almost the whole of the unilluminated disc of the planet; it was so striking I appearance, that I thought it must be the resemblance of the Moon, which made me fancy that I could see the unilluminated portion.
My sister in law, whom I called to witness the planet, but
without telling her what to look for, said she instantly saw the whole disc.
The atmosphere was beautifully clear, but still the planet was so far past
conjunction, that I should scarcely have imagined the phenomena would be
visible.
J F Barber, Stanton by Dale Nottingham
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Dorado is a modern constellation in the southern hemisphere
it cannot be seen from Britain. Dorado
was one of twelve constellations named by Petrus Plancius on his star globe of
1597 and was based on information sent back by the Dutch navigators Pieter
Keyser and Frederick Houtman, when they voyaged to the southern hemisphere. The
constellation then appeared on a star map produced by Johan Bayer in 1603.
The term Dorado today is usually translated as the goldfish
which is how it appears on modern star maps. However, the name Dorado is
Spanish for mahi-mahi, or the dolphinfish. The mahi-mahi has an opalescent skin
that turns blue and gold as the fish dies. This may very well be the reason
Dorado is sometimes called the goldfish.
There are very few bright stars in Dorado, alpha which has no name is a magnitude 3.3 star and lies at a distance of 169 light years, and is an A class star hotter than the Sun.
Beta which again has no name but is s member of the
important Cepheid class of stars that astronomers use to determine how far away
the stars are. Beta varies between magnitude 3.5 and 4.1 and is 1,040 light
years away. The first of the cepheid variable stars was discovered by John
Goodricke the deaf astronomer in York in 1784.
By far the most interesting object in Dorado is the Large
Magellanic Cloud (LMC) a dwarf galaxy around 170,000 light years away. The
first recorded mention of the LMC was by the Persian astronomer `Abd al-Rahman
al-Sufi Shirazi, (later known in Europe as "Al Sufi"), in his Book of
Fixed Stars published around 964 CE. The next recorded observation was in
1503–4 by Amerigo Vespucci, Ferdinand Magellan sighted the LMC on his voyage in
1519, and his writings brought the LMC into common Western knowledge. The
galaxy now bears his name.
The LMC is the fourth-largest galaxy in the Local Group,
after the Andromeda Galaxy (M31), the Milky Way, and the Triangulum Galaxy
(M33). There is a Small Magellanic Cloud in the constellation of Tucana the
Toucan.
The LMC contains around 10 million stars. It can easily be
seen with the naked eye. There are lots of important star clusters and nebula
in the LMC including the Tarantula Nebula. This was first observed by Nicolas
Louis de Lacaille when he was observing at the Cape of Good Hope between 1751
and 1752.
The Tarantula Nebula is a massive star forming area within
the LMC if it was as close as the Orion Nebula another star forming area and
only 1,500 light years away it would be so bright that it would cast shadows.
One of thing to mention about the LMC was that in 1987 a
bright supernova appeared. The supernova was discovered by Ian Shelton and
Oscar Duhalde at the Las Campanas Observatory in Chile on February 24, 1987,
and within the same 24 hours independently by the amateur astronomer Albert
Jones in New Zealand. The supernova
reached a peak magnitude of about 3.0 in May before its brightness declined in
the following months.
Four days after the event was recorded, the progenitor star
was identified as Sanduleak −69° 202, a blue supergiant
It was only in 2019 over 30 years after the explosion that
astronomers found the central neutron star.
This star is known as SN1987A and as it is the closest
supernova to us since the invention of the telescopes it has been studied
extensively by astronomers and has allowed them to learn a great deal about how
a supernova works.
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Nature, March 6th 1873
The shower of meteors on the night of November 27rh 1872 was
evidently well seen from Europe, as I had anticipated, but no such notice seems
to have been taken of the shower on the night of the 24th.
On that night there was an equally fine display in Jamaica,
from about the same radiant point; the night of the 25th was cloudy,
and only a few meteors were seen on the night of the 26th, which was
clear; and the shower on the 27th was simply a repetition of the
shower on the 24th; but on both occasions the numbers seen here were
somewhat less than in Europe.
These meteors must therefore form two almost distinct bands passing round the Sun, which their association with the comet of Biela renders particularly interesting; it is just possible that these two bands intersect, and that one part of the comet belongs to ne band and the other part to the other, and that they came into notice and actual contact about the same time in the year 1846, and of course afterwards separated .
Maxwell Hall
Jamaica, January 5th 1873
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The variations in the appearance of a nebula to different eyes and with different telescopes make it very difficult to establish a physical change, though observers in the southern hemisphere hold that such has certainly taken place in the case of the nebula in which the remarkable variable star eta Argus is involved. Prof. Holden has lately collected the evidence bearing on the question of change in another remarkable nebula—that known, from its peculiar form, as the Greek omega—and from a careful comparison of the relative positions of the nebula and accompanying stars, in drawings made at different times, he infers that, while the stars and one portion of the nebula show no change, another portion appears to have moved considerably.
This may be a veritable change in the structure of the
nebula, or it may be a case of proper motion; in either case the fact, if well
established, would be of great interest. The drawings examined were:
—Herschel’s in 1837, Lamont's in 1837, Mason's in 1839, Lassell’s in 1862, and
finally two by Trouvelot in 1875, with different telescopes, one of 6 inches
aperture, and the other the Washington refractor of 26 inches.
Messrs Thomas Cooke and Sons of York had a display of scientific instruments for the meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science. It was the 50th anniversary meeting in York. The first was held in York in 1831.
Cookes had on display an achromatic telescope OG of 15.5 inches in a brass cell. In addition, there was a transit instrument and a large fixed equatorial telescope for the Spanish Transit of Venus expedition in 1882.
There was also an electrically controlled chronograph for
recording astronomical observations. In addition, a solar spectroscope with 5
prisms and double ray reversion equal to 20 prisms.
www.theramblingastronomer.co.uk
Join me, Martin Lunn MBE every Monday evening from 7.00 pm-9.00 pm on the award-winning Astronomy Show on Drystone Radio, probably the only regular astronomy show on any radio station in the country.
I will take my weekly look at the night sky and look at all
the latest news in astronomy. There will be the astronomical anniversaries this
week plus the latest news from the astronomical societies in the north of
England.
The Astronomy Show every Monday evening only on Drystone Radio live online at www.drystoneradio.com DAB radio in Bradford and East Lancashire, or 102 and 103.5 FM and can also be heard later on the Drystone Radio Podcast.
In August 1947 a social evening was held to commemorate the retirement of 5 veteran craftsmen at Cookes. Messrs A Harrison, T Dwyer, C Grewer, W Wrigley and J Danby all had worked for over 50 years at Cookes, they all stared at the end of the 19th century.
Some of Mr Taylor’s anecdotes were enlightening to a younger
generation, whilst others created amusement which continued with responses from the honoured guests.
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