When Professor Joseph Winlock succeeded the second Bond as the Observatory director in 1866, the pressing need for new equipment resulted in the gift of a spectroscope and meridian circle from friends of the College.

By the end of Winlock's career the first stage in the Observatory's development was completed. The second stage first stage in the Observatory's development was completed. The second stage which lasted up until the age or Shapley, was a time of valuable phometric and photographic studies, extending from 1876 to 1921.

Edward C. Pickering, professor of Astronomy, was the central figure after 1876. He entered with a new attack on astronomy, applying his background as a physicist to the construction of equipment capable of measuring the light of the various stars to determine their magnitudes. He began the photographic survey of the skies, and his work was so extensive that much of it has been used to solve fundamental problems of today.

It was during Pickering's forty two-year reign that Harvard began establishing its distant posts. Picketing set out in search of conditions of atmosphere most favorable in "respect to clearness steadiness, and equability of temperature." He experimented at stations between 6,000 and 14,000 feet in the Rockies in Colorado. Performing work at the higher attitude ever attempted including Pike's peak.

It was Pickering that first sent the Harvard astronomers south of the border. His assistants were not content with the Rockies, but moved to the Peruvian Andes where they explored the entire country for a suitable post location. Their first station was at Mt. Harvard near Lima at an altitude of 6600 feet. But the station that they finally decided to use was on Arequipa, slightly above 3,000 feet. There they found perfect atmospheric conditions in the long winter nights to take photographs not possible at Cambridge. A telescope increases its power by a factor of five, when operated under these circumstances.

Pickering's Achievements

The developments recorded at the Peruvian station pushed Pickering into the limelight as one of the top astronomers in the world. A newspaper of the day stated that. "His discoveries will add another laurel to his great institution."

In his report given in March 1915, Pickering stated. "The Observatory is not known chiefly for the size of its telescopes or for the beauty of its buildings, but the addition it has made to the sum of human knowledge in its particular department of science has been equaled by no other institution of its kind in the United States and by few in the world. Our equipment is the best." Throughout Pickering's time the study of the physical properties of the stars was paramount.

A separate chapter in the annals of the institution is the monumental work done by Miss Annle J. Cannon in compiling the Henry Draper Catalogue. She worked through the terms of both Pickering and Shapley. Her classification of all the stars in the sky down to the eighth magnitude was one of the largest investigations ever conducted in this or any other observatory.

Over 225,000 stars were listed in the nine volumes of the Annals containing her reports the exhausting work lasting from 1911 to 1924. She well deserved the title of the greatest woman astronomer in the world.

Later Miss Cannon published additional classifications of 50,000 faint stars. Much of her work is still stored in the relatively new astrophysical building which now houses the half million phtographs that have accumulated throughout the years.

During the last thirty odd years under Shapley's administration, the Observatory has made its greatest strides forward. It was he who established the Agassiz Station at Harvard, the transfer of the southern station from Peru to South Africa, and with the collaboration of Menzel, the installation at Climax, Colorado. The new headquarters building in Cambridge was built under his direction, and provides fireproof housing for the nearly half million plates which contain Harvard's history of the sky for the past sixty years.

Branch Stations

The Agassiz Oak Ride station was established in 1932 in the midst of 40 acres of heavily wooded land in Harvard township, 25 miles Northeast of Cambridge. It holds many of the instruments removed from Summer House Hill when the northward spread of the city rendered the old location too poor for optimum conditions for astronomical observations. This station contains a 16 inch doublet, a 24 inch reflector, and a 61 inch telescope, the largest east of Ohio. The "Ridge" is now headquarters for Harvard's surveys of the Northern skies. The Harvard seismographic equipment is also at the Agassiz Oak Ridge station along with a dozen astronomical telescopes and patrol cameras. There is no heat in the telescope buildings at the stations, and observers freeze in the winter when the steep roofs slide back and the cameras go into action. The large lenses are too sensitive to allow for quick temperature changes, and therefore the temperature of the buildings is always at the mercy of the weather. Often staff members report for work dressed in heavy furs to survive the bitter nights.

Down in Harvard Chops in Orange Free State, eight telescopes cover the entire southern heaven and visible parts of the northern sky. The equipment currently contained there was transferred from the Peruvian station when it closed down in 1926, and is supplemented by modern material and the ADH instrument.