Mary Watson Whitney (September 11, 1847 – January 20, 1921) was an
American astronomer
An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses their studies on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. They observe astronomical objects such as stars, planets, moons, comets and galaxies – in either ...
and for 22 years the head of the
Vassar Observatory where 102 scientific papers were published under her guidance.
Early life and education
Whitney was born on September 11, 1847, in
Waltham,
Massachusetts
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. Her mother was Mary Watson Crehore and her father was Samuel Buttrick Whitney. Her father was successful in real estate and wealthy enough to provide her with a good education for a woman at the time. She went to school in Waltham where she excelled in mathematics and graduated from the public high school in 1863. She was privately tutored for one year before she entered
Vassar College
Vassar College ( ) is a private liberal arts college in Poughkeepsie, New York, United States. Founded in 1861 by Matthew Vassar, it was the second degree-granting institution of higher education for women in the United States, closely foll ...
in 1865, where she met the astronomer
Maria Mitchell
Maria Mitchell (Help:IPA/English, /məˈraɪə/; August 1, 1818 – June 28, 1889) was an American astronomer, librarian, naturalist, and educator. In 1847, she discovered a comet named 1847 VI (modern designation C/1847 T1) that was later kno ...
. During her time at Vassar College, her father died and her brother was lost at sea. She obtained her degree in 1868.
From 1869 to 1870, she took some courses about
quaternions
In mathematics, the quaternion number system extends the complex numbers. Quaternions were first described by the Irish mathematician William Rowan Hamilton in 1843 and applied to mechanics in three-dimensional space. Hamilton defined a quater ...
and
celestial mechanics
Celestial mechanics is the branch of astronomy that deals with the motions of objects in outer space. Historically, celestial mechanics applies principles of physics (classical mechanics) to astronomical objects, such as stars and planets, to ...
by
Benjamin Peirce
Benjamin Peirce (; April 4, 1809 – October 6, 1880) was an American mathematician who taught at Harvard University for approximately 50 years. He made contributions to celestial mechanics, statistics, number theory, algebra, and the philoso ...
(at
Harvard). At the time, women could not be admitted to Harvard so she attended as a guest.
She obtained her master's degree from Vassar in 1872, afterwards she went to
Zürich
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, twintowns = Kunming, San Francisco
Zürich ...
for 3 years where she studied mathematics and celestial mechanics.
Professional career
Returning to the US, she became a teacher at her hometown high school until she became an assistant of Maria Mitchell in Vassar. In 1888 upon the retirement of Mitchell she became a professor and the director of the
observatory there until she retired in 1915 for health reasons.
During her career, she concentrated on teaching and research related to
double stars,
variable star
A variable star is a star whose brightness as seen from Earth (its apparent magnitude) changes with time. This variation may be caused by a change in emitted light or by something partly blocking the light, so variable stars are classified as e ...
s,
asteroids,
comet
A comet is an icy, small Solar System body that, when passing close to the Sun, warms and begins to release gases, a process that is called outgassing. This produces a visible atmosphere or coma, and sometimes also a tail. These phenomena ...
s, and measurements by
photographic plates. Under her direction, 102 articles were published at the Vassar Observatory. In 1889, her mother and sister both became ill and Whitney moved them to the Observatory where she could care for them and continue her work part-time. When they died two years later, she resumed full-time work.
Whitney was a fellow of the
American Association for the Advancement of Science and a charter member of the
Astronomical and Astrophysical Society.
When the
Maria Mitchell Association
The Maria Mitchell Association is a private non-profit organization on the island of Nantucket off the coast of Massachusetts. The association owns the Maria Mitchell Observatory, a second observatory (the Loines Observatory), a Natural History ...
was established in
Nantucket, Massachusetts in 1902, Whitney became its first president.
Whitney believed that science provided strong career opportunities for women. She hoped that women would soon become more active in practical chemistry, architecture, dentistry, and agriculture, which were more lucrative and, in Whitney’s view, particularly well suited to women. Moreover, she believed that scientific training would prepare them to be good mothers, falling into more traditional tropes of the early 20th century.
She also funded the advancement of women in science. In 1908, when an observatory was built on Nantucket, Whitney raised money to fund a female research fellow.
In her will, she bequeathed $5,000 to Vassar to support research by women.
Later life
Whitney died in Waltham on January 20, 1921, of pneumonia.
References
External links
Whitneygen.org*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Whitney, Mary Watson
American women astronomers
1847 births
1921 deaths
Harvard University alumni
Vassar College alumni
Vassar College faculty