Harvard College Observatory, Edward Pickering 2

As director of the Harvard College Observatory, Edward Pickering cultivated relations with potential sponsors of its expansion, such as Anna Draper, Uriah Boyden, and Catherine Bruce. Draper funded the sprawling Henry Draper Memorial catalog of stellar spectra, named after her husband, a physician and amateur astronomer who died in 1882. The Boyden fund made it possible to build the observatory’s permanent station in Arequipa, Peru, to map out the southern sky. Bruce’s gift covered the cost of a double telescope that was sent to Arequipa. When needed, Pickering also made financial contributions from his own pocket.¹

In 1891, Pickering put his brother, William Henry Pickering, whom he had hired as an assistant, in charge of the new Arequipa outpost. Much to Edward’s dismay, William began submitting observations of the planet Mars via telegraph to the New York Herald in anticipation of the Red Planet’s 1892 opposition. These missives helped stir a public frenzy over supposed Martian canals that might have been created by intelligent inhabitants. As one disapproving observer described it, it was “the time of the great Mars boom, when public imbecility and journalistic enterprise combined to flood the papers and society with ‘news from Mars,’ and queries concerning Mars, most exasperating to grave thinkers and workers in science.”²

Edward Pickering was certainly furious and—given the great liberties William took in ignoring the work which he had actually been assigned to do and his continually mounting extravagances—he recalled his brother with the approval of the Harvard Corporation.

Others proved far more reliable. As noted by Annie Cannon:³

Williamina Fleming, Antonia Maury, Henrietta Swan Leavitt, and Cannon were among the most prominent figures to work as a computer at the observatory. The exemplary partnership of Mary Anna and Henry Draper was likely suggestive of the possibilities of involving women in research.

Pickering was the recipient of the highest honors from both US and European institutions; these included membership in the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1867, the National Academy of Sciences in 1873, as well as the national societies of England, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Mexico, Russia, and Sweden. Moreover, he served as president of the American Astronomical Society from 1905 to 1919 and the American Association of Variable Star Observers, which was founded in 1911 and coordinated observations and their analysis by mainly amateur astronomers.⁴ He was also the founder and first president of the Appalachian Mountain Club.

Edward Pickering died in Cambridge, Massachusetts on February 3, 1919. The International Astronomical Union (IAU) named a lunar crater⁵ after him in 1935 and a Martian crater⁶ in 1973. In addition, Asteroid 784, discovered in 1914, was named Pickeringia.⁷

References

1. Solon I. Bailey, “Edward Charles Pickering, 1846–1919,” Biographical Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences, 15, 1932, 169–189, https://www.nasonline.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/pickering-edward.pdf.
2. Quote from Mary A. Clerke, “New views about Mars,” Edinburgh Review, 184, 1896, 368–385. See also Matthew Shindell, For the Love of Mars (University of Chicago Press, 2023), doi:10.7208/chicago/9780226821900.001.0001.
3. Annie J. Cannon, “Edward Charles Pickering,” Popular Astronomy, 27, 1919, 177–182.
4. Ibid.
5. https://planetarynames.wr.usgs.gov/Feature/4722.
6. https://planetarynames.wr.usgs.gov/Feature/4723.
7. Lutz D. Schmadel, "(784) Pickeringia,” in Dictionary of Minor Planet Names (Springer, 2007), p. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-29925-7.

Cite this resource

Bretislav Friedrich and Maria McEachern, “Edward Pickering, 1,” Harvard College Observatory history guide, American Institute of Physics, 2026,

Note that this material was originally developed in concert with the Williamina Fleming history guide as part of the Women in the History of Quantum Physics collection.