Excerpt from Catalogue of Stars Within One Degree of the North Pole: And Optical Distortion of the Helsingfors Astro-Photographic Telescope Deduced From Photographic Measures
The Vassar College Observatory was established in 1865, when Vassar College was first opened to the public. It was built and equipped for purposes of instruction, the plan of founder and trustees not including scientific work for publication. The first director was Maria Mitchell, well known as a discoverer of comets, and as the recipient of a medal from the King of Denmark for the discovery of a comet in 1847. Professor Mitchell published a series of observations on the surface features of Jupiter and Saturn in Silliman's Journal and the American Journal of Science. Since 1890 an effort has been made to carry on a certain amount of observational work outside that involved in instruction, and this has been given mainly to minor planets and comets. Publications have been sent with more or less regularity to the current astronomical journals. The present paper is the first regular publication of the observatory.
The site of the observatory is on the grounds of Vassar College, about three miles east of the Hudson River, in Poughkeepsie, New York.
The adopted latitude of the observatory is 41° 41' 18". The adopted longitude of the observatory is 4h 5m 33s.6 west of Greenwich.
The latitude was obtained by Professor Mitchell in 1872, by the zenith telescope method. The telescope was loaned by the U. S. Coast Survey. The longitude was also obtained by Professor Mitchell, by electric telegraph connection with Harvard College Observatory in 1877. Clock signals were exchanged for one evening only, and there was no change of observers.
The observatory consists of a central dome, with wings to the south, east and north. The south wing contains a clock room and a class room, the east wing, the meridian room, the north wing the living rooms of director and assistant. In the dome, twenty-five feet in diameter, stands a twelve-inch equatorial with the usual equipment of eye-pieces and filar micrometer. The object glass of the equatorial was originally made by Fitz of New York, but was afterwards recut by Alvan Clark. The telescope was remounted in 1888 by Warner and Swasey of Cleveland, Ohio.
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