George van den Bergh (25 April 1890 in

Oss OSS or Oss may refer to: Places * Oss, a city and municipality in the Netherlands * Osh Airport, IATA code OSS People with the name * Oss (surname), a surname Arts and entertainment * ''O.S.S.'' (film), a 1946 World War II spy film about ...

– 3 October 1966 in

Oegstgeest Oegstgeest () is a town and municipality in the province of South Holland in the western Netherlands. Its population was in . Etymology The portion ''geest'' in the name refers to the geest lands, which were excavated in the seventeenth cent ...

) was a Dutch law professor and amateur astronomer. Van den Bergh was the son of Samuel van den Bergh, one of the founders of

Unilever Unilever plc is a British multinational consumer goods company with headquarters in London, England. Unilever products include food, condiments, bottled water, baby food, soft drink, ice cream, instant coffee, cleaning agents, energy drink, t ...

. His brother Sidney James and his nephew Maarten would follow his father in business life, while George pursued an academic career. He was a lawyer in

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the Capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population ...

, 1915–1936. From 1925–33 he was a member of the House of Representatives of the Netherlands. He was author of ''Aarde en wereld in ruimte en tijd: Een uiteenzetting voor iedereen'' (1935) which was translated into English in 1937 as ''The Universe in Space and Time'' (U.K. edition) and ''Astronomy for the Millions'' (U.S. edition).

Etty Hillesum Esther (Etty) Hillesum (15 January 1914 – 30 November 1943) was the Dutch author of confessional letters and diaries which describe both her religious awakening and the persecutions of Jewish people in Amsterdam during the German occupation. I ...

(''An Interrupted Life'') mentions that he was arrested and detained by the Nazis in 1941. He survived the war. During the 1950s he studied the longer

eclipse cycle Eclipses may occur repeatedly, separated by certain intervals of time: these intervals are called eclipse cycles. The series of eclipses separated by a repeat of one of these intervals is called an eclipse series. Eclipse conditions Eclipses ...

s, allowing him to predict

solar Solar may refer to: Astronomy * Of or relating to the Sun ** Solar telescope, a special purpose telescope used to observe the Sun ** A device that utilizes solar energy (e.g. "solar panels") ** Solar calendar, a calendar whose dates indicate t ...

and

lunar eclipse A lunar eclipse occurs when the Moon moves into the Earth's shadow. Such alignment occurs during an eclipse season, approximately every six months, during the full moon phase, when the Moon's orbital plane is closest to the plane of the Earth ...

s over a long time interval. This was published in 1951 as ''Regelmaat en wisseling bij zonsverduisteringen, met een aanhangsel over maansverduisteringen'' and translated into English in 1955 as ''Periodicity and Variation of Solar (and Lunar) Eclipses''. In 1958 he developed a compressed form of typesetting called Hoofdletters, published as '' Hoofdletters, Tweeling- en Meerlingdruk''. The crater

Van den Bergh Van den Bergh, Van Den Bergh is a Dutch surname, a variant of Van den Berg. Notable people with the surname include: *Arnold van den Bergh (notary) (1886‒1950), Amsterdam civil law notary *Dave van den Bergh (born 1976), Dutch footballer *Dimitr ...

on the

Moon The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It is the fifth largest satellite in the Solar System and the largest and most massive relative to its parent planet, with a diameter about one-quarter that of Earth (comparable to the width of ...

is named after him.

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Bergh, George van den 1890 births 1966 deaths 20th-century Dutch astronomers 20th-century Dutch lawyers Members of the House of Representatives (Netherlands) Municipal councillors of Amsterdam Social Democratic Workers' Party (Netherlands) politicians People from Oss