Harvard College Observatory History in Images

This is a personal project collecting and documenting early images of Harvard College Observatory, focusing on the site at Observatory Hill (previously Summer House Hill). Buildings, instruments, people, and observations.

Disclaimer: all content here is solely my own views, and in no way represents the views of my employer, or anyone else. Also, I'm documenting things as I learn about them, so expect frequent errors. Corrections will occur without notice and without a changelog at this point.

Mary Anna Palmer Draper

This page shows a list of all images tagged with "Mary Anna Palmer Draper".

[link]1891

Earliest source: "[Observatory women computers], 1891." Harvard University Archives / HUV 1210 (9-3). Harvard Libraries, ^{olvwork289691}

A group photo of computers at Harvard together with Mary Anna Palmer Draper, aka Mrs. Henry Draper. She's seated in the middle. After her husband's death, she contributed a significant sum of money to continue her late husbands' dream of scientific astrophotograpy, leading to the Draper Catalog, an ambitious project of the Observatory. Many, though not all, computers were funded for this project.

Harvard dates this as 1891. It seems to be approximately the same time as other photos with similar groups of women, taken in the same room. I think there were two pairs of photos taken on different days.

The photo was taken in the long computing room (see 1876 floor plans) on the south side of the second floor (the top floor, excluding the dome) of the building. The photograph was taken facing east, and the doorway in the photo is the closet shown in the floor plan.

Left to right:

unknown (standing)

unknown (seated)

possibly Eve Leland

Mrs. Draper (seated)

Antonia Maury

Williamina Fleming

possibly Mabel C. Stevens (or some other Stevens)

probably Florence Cushman

unknown

Note that Stevens is Mrs. Fleming's maiden name, and she did have other relatives in Boston, but so far I don't know if any of the other Stevens that worked at the Observatary are related.

[Observatory women computers], 1891

1891

General: The women depicted in this photograph analyized stellar photographs and computed data at the Harvard College Observatory.

[link]1891

Earliest source: "Observatory girls with Mrs. Draper, 1891
Alternate Title: [Observatory computer room and staff], 1891." Harvard University Archives / HUV 1210 (9-5). Harvard Libraries, ^{olvwork289692}

Another photograph taken in the same place and on the same day as the previous, with the same people.

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