Marcel Griffioen
Astronomy, Per. 5
Mr. Percival
8 January 2014
Astronomer Biography –
George Airy
George Biddell Airy was born in
Alnwick, Northumberland, England on July 27th, 1801 and died in Greenwich,
England, on January 2nd, 1892, the eldest of four children. He
attended Byatt Walker’s school at Colchester but was not particularly
well-liked as he was introverted and snobbish. He learned basic subjects along
with his classmates, and won some friends through constructing peashooters and
other toys. At age twelve, he met his uncle, Arthur Biddle, who was a
well-educated man and saw in him an opportunity to escape his current life
which he found restrictive. At his request, his uncle almost literally
kidnapped him, and he spent nearly half of his time with him over the next few
years, during which he made several well-known acquaintances. He was then
accepted to Trinity College in Cambridge.
During his time at Cambridge, he
developed the habit of carrying a notebook at all times in which he did
mathematics and translations in Latin and Greek daily, and wrote down all of
his thoughts. He also met his future wife while attending Trinity, proposed to
her, and was denied by her father, then proceeded to repeatedly propose to her
for six years until he was finally allowed to marry her.
After graduating, he became a
professor at Cambridge and ascended through the ranks of professors until he
came to be in charge of the observatory. After several years as the caretaker
of the Cambridge Observatory, he left to become astronomer royal at the
observatory in Greenwich. As caretaker of this observatory, he turned it into a
well-oiled machine which carried out its orders and did not allow much in the
way of individual thought. During his time at Greenwich, he was also consulted about
the potential discovery of Neptune, and was initially skeptical, but upon the
discovery of the planet credited Le Verrier with its discovery.
No comments:
Post a Comment