University of Pittsburgh - Owl Yearbook (Pittsburgh, PA)

 - Class of 1908

Page 21 of 404

 

University of Pittsburgh - Owl Yearbook (Pittsburgh, PA) online collection, 1908 Edition, Page 21 of 404
Page 21 of 404



University of Pittsburgh - Owl Yearbook (Pittsburgh, PA) online collection, 1908 Edition, Page 20
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Page 21 text:

SAMUEL PIERPONT LANGLEY Director of the Allegheny Observatory, 1867-1887. By John Alfred Brashear. The man of grand impulses sheds a lustre on all around him. GREAT man lias gone to his rest. A life filled with the highest aspirations has closed and we are left to mourn the loss of one whose place will Ik difficult to fill. The writer was associated with Professor Langley for more than thirty years, and in all those years lie has only pleasant recollections of his personality and his magnificent intellect—one never satisfied with a half-proven hypothesis, hut always reaching out for final proof before he announced any of his great discoveries. Not every man who came in contact with Professor Langley knew him as the writer knew him. Many times he has walked for miles with him. During the walk nothing would escape his mouth hut monosyllables. Was he cold, indifferent, callous to the questioner? Far from it. Some difficult, perhaps intricate problem in solar physics or other correlated study had taken possession of his mind to the exclusion of all else, and 1 have often thought that his yes” or no” to my questions were almost of an automatic character. But how different at other times, during our walks from the old observatory to the nearest woods, where now is erected the new Astronomical ()bservatory. Charming was his conversation from the beginning to the end of our stroll. W hen in this mood no man could be more entertaining and instructive than Professor x3

Page 20 text:

trustees of the Western University of Pennsylvania. The association had incurred an indebtedness of about $12,000 and they recognized that to carry it on in the interests of education and the advancement of science a fund must Ik- raised to pay the debt, and also raise a fund to endow a chair of astronomy in the university. It was therefore proposed to raise the sum of $30,000. bv which this desirable end should be attained. The future usefulness of the observatory seemed to lx fully recognized by the Ix ard at that time, as the minutes of this date are filled with expressions of ho|ie and prophecy regarding both the university and the observatory. A large majority of stockholders and contributors voted to convey their interests in the Observatory to the University, with the proviso that they were to be credited with the amount they had subscribed, and provided further that they should have the privileges formerly accorded them of making occasional use of the instruments, and provided still further that an endowment fund lx raised and the property forever be held for observatory purposes. The Astronomical Association through its officers conveyed the observatory to the Western University on the first day of July, 1867. The records of this transfer cover many pages of the minute books of the Western University, and lxar testimony to the care with which the transfer was made. On the 8th of August, 1867, Professor S. 1 . Langley was unanimously elected to the chair of Astronomy and Physics. At this meeting it was resolved to equip the observatory with a transit instrument, chronograph. cl x ks. etc. The duties of the Professor of Astronomy were also decided ii|x n, in which it was to teach the classes in astronomy and physics in the university, duties from which he was afterwards entirely released. At a meeting held June 8. 1869, it was decided to change the name of the Allegheny Observatory to The Observatory of the Western University of Pennsylvania. but at the meeting of the board on the 4th of October of the same year the motion to change the name was rescinded, and the old name retained. Subscriptions to the endowment fund and paying off the debt amounted at this period to the sum of $15,000. subscribed by Dr. Hussey. Hon. Thomas M. Howe. Mr. William Thaw, Thomas A. Clark, Thomas Fawcett, Christopher Zug. ( has. Knapp. James 15. Lyon. Mr. Hostetter. Mr. Smith and General Cass. This fund covered the indebtedness of the Astronomical Association, leaving a balance of $3,000 toward the endowment fund, thus requiring $17,000 to complete the endowment of $20,000. This amount, so far as 1 have been able to find out. was contributed by Mr. Thaw, who a few years afterwards also contributed $100,000 to the University Fund. It was stipulated by Mr. Thaw that the director of tiie observatory should be free from teaching in the university, except to deliver lectures at his convenience and thus lx free to carry on original research. From this time onward the institution t x k its place among the working observatories of the world. It would lx impossible within the limits of this paper to tell you more than a moiety of the splendid observations and discoveries made by Professor Langley and his able assistants. The long series of solar observations, for which this region is so well suited, gave to the world new views of the sun and its surroundings: and the series of magnificent drawings of sun sjxns made by Professors Langley. Frost. Keeler and Mr. Very are now considered classic and invaluable in our studies of solar phenomena.



Page 22 text:

Langley—indeed, some of the most delightful remembrances of my long association with him come to me as I recall these delightful walks and talks. When he was writing his New Astronomy, he would invite me to come to the observaton in the evening and read to me a chapter of that splendid book. 1 call to mind the closing paragraphs of two that impressed me greatly, as he read them, and for fear that 1 may not quote verbatim I refer to his chapter on the Moon where, in closing his charming description of its scenery, he says, ‘‘Let us leave here the desolation about us, happy that we can come back at will to that world, our own familiar dwelling, where the meadows are still green and the birds still sing, and where, better yet, still dwells our own kind—surely the world of all we have found in our wanderings, which we would have chosen to lx? our home. Let me also quote the closing paragraph of his chapter on the Stars, which 1 heard him read “in the long ago , a beautiful illustration of the life history of man as compared to that of the Stars: “I have read somewhere a story about a race of ephemeral insects who live alxnit an hour. To those who are born in the early morning the sunrise is the time of youth. They die of old age while his beams arc yet gathering force, and only their descendants live on to midday; while it is another race which sees the sun decline, from that which saw him rise. Imagine the sun about to set. and the whole nation of mites gathered under the shadow of some mushroom (to them, ancient as the sun itself) to hear what their wisest philosopher has to say of the gloomy prospect. If I remember aright, he first told them that, incredible as it might seem, there was not only a time in the world’s youth when the mushroom itself was young, but that the sun in those early ages was in the eastern, not in the western sky. Since then, he explained, the eyes of scientific ephemera had followed it. and established by induction from vast experience the great i iw of Nature’, that it moved only westward: and he showed that since it was now nearing the western horizon, science itself pointed to the conclusion that it was about to disappear forever, together with the great race of ephemera for whom it was created. What his hearers thought of this discourse I do not remember, hut I have heard that the sun rose again the next morning. Professor Langley was a lover of children. I have heard it from many friends whose homes he visited, how he would gather the little ones around him and tell them fairy stories, many of which he would improvise with wonderful tact to please the children. A Washington lady had made several attempts to converse with Professor Langley—at receptions—upon his scientific investigations but, failing to get the response desired, in her despair she asked him one evening what he did like to talk about. He quickly replied, “Children and fairy stories. The writer of this brief sketch of Professor Langley’s life feels totally inadequate to the task, but deems it a great pleasure to place on record some of the lovely traits of character on the side of the humanities, separate and distinct from his scientific work—for with all that apparent ‘‘calmest coldness there was something 14

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