Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-2plfb Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-30T10:54:48.787Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Pulkovo Observatory and the National Observatory Movement: An Historical Overview

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 July 2016

Steven J. Dick
Steven J. Dick*
Affiliation:
U.S. Naval Observatory 34th and Massachusetts Ave., NW Washington, D. C. 20392 USA

Abstract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

The patronage of national governments has played an important role in the history of astronomy, classically in the form of National Observatories. In this paper we 1) argue that the last three centuries have seen what we may call a “national observatory movement,” in that national governments during this period increasingly supported astronomical observatories, and in that such institutions share certain common properties of origin, purpose and evolution; 2) demonstrate the important role that Pulkovo Observatory has played in this movement; and 3) compare certain aspects of the Pulkovo Observatory and the United States Naval Observatory as exemplars of this species founded within a decade of each other under very different political conditions.

Type
Part 1: The legacy of Pulkovo for inertial systems and reference frames
Information
Symposium - International Astronomical Union , Volume 141: Inertial Coordinate System on the Sky , 1990 , pp. 29 - 38
Copyright
Copyright © Kluwer 1990 

References

Abbe, C. (1868). “Dorpat and Poulkova,” in Annual Report of the Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institution , Government Printing Office, Washington. 370–390.Google Scholar
Airy, G. B. (1848). “Schreiben des Herrn Airy, Konigl. Astronomen in Greenwich, an den Herausgeber. Royal Observatory Greenwich, 1847 November 26,” in Astronomische Nachrichten , 26, 353–360.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ansari, S. M. R. (1985). “The Observatories Movement in India During the 17 — 18th Centuries,” Vistas in Astronomy , 28, 379–85.Google Scholar
Batten, A. H. (1988). Resolute and Undertaking Characters: The Lives of Wilhelm and Otto Struve , D. Reidel, Dordrecht.Google Scholar
Chapman, C. (1983). “The Accuracy of Angular Measuring Instruments used in Astronomy between 1500 and 1850,” Journal for the History of Astronomy , 14, 133–37.Google Scholar
Daedev, A. N. (1972). Pulkovo Observatory: An Essay on its History and Scientific Activity , Izdatel'stvo Nauka, Leningrad, trans. Krisciunas, K. (1977).Google Scholar
Debarbat, S., Grillot, S. and Levy, J. (1984). L'Observatoire de Paris: Son Histoire (1667-1963) , Observatoire de Paris, Paris.Google Scholar
Dick, J. (1951). “The 250th Anniversary of the Berlin Observatory,” Popular Astronomy , 59, 524–535.Google Scholar
Dick, S. J. (1980). “How the U. S. Naval Observatory Began, 1830-1865,” Sky and Telescope , 60, 466–471; reprinted with corrections and notes in Dick, S. J. and Doggett, L. E., Sky with Ocean Joined: Proceedings of the Sesquicentennial Symposia of the U.S. Naval Observatory, U. S. Naval Observatory, Washington, D. C., 1983, 1983-181.Google Scholar
Gould, B. A. (1849). “An Account of the Observatory at Pulkowa,” reprinted from North American Review , July, 1849, 1849–20.Google Scholar
Krisciunas, K. (1978). “A Short History of Pulkovo Observatory,” Vistas in Astronomy , 22, 27–37.Google Scholar
Krisciunas, K. (1988). Astronomical Centers of the World , Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, England.Google Scholar
Meadows, A. J. (1975). Greenwich Observatory: Recent History (1836-1975) , volume 2 of the Greenwich Tercentenary history, Taylor and Francis, London.Google Scholar
McCutcheon, Robert. “Stalin's Purge of Soviet Astronomers,” Sky and Telescope (October, 1989), 352–57.Google Scholar
Paullin, Charles O. (1923). “Early Movements for a National Observatory, 1802-1842”, Records of the Columbia Historical Society , 25, 36–56.Google Scholar
Price, Derek J. de Solla (1963). Little Science, Big Science , Columbia University Press, New York.Google Scholar
Pulkovo Observatory. (1889). Zum 50-Jahrigen Bestehn der Nicolai-Hauptsternwarte, Kaiserlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften , St. Petersburg.Google Scholar
Rhees, W. J. (1879). “Congressional Proceedings, Twenty-Sixth Congress, 1839-41,” in The Smithsonian Institution: Documents Relative to its Origin and History, Smithsonian Institution , Washington, 200–246, esp. 220-222.Google Scholar
Sadler, D. H. (1976). “Lunar Distances and the Nautical Almanac,” in The Origins, Achievement and Influence of the Royal Observatory, Greenwich: 1675-1975, Vistas in Astronomy , 20, 113–121.Google Scholar
Sokolovskaya, Z. K. (1976). “Struve” in Dictionary of Scientific Biography , 13, 108–121.Google Scholar
Struve, F. G. W. (1845), Description de L'Observatoire Astronomique Central de Poulkova, L'Academie Imperiale des Sciences , St. Petersburg.Google Scholar
Struve, O. (1865) Ubersicht der Thatigkeit der Nicolai-Hauptsternwarte wahrend der ersten 25 Jahre ihres Bestehens , Kaiserlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften, St. Petersburg.Google Scholar
Weinberg, Alvin (1967). Reflections on Big Science , The MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass. Google Scholar