Letters on Astronomy (Illustrated Edition)
Cód:
491_9781406803662
Denison Olmsted (1791-1859) was an American physicist and astronomer credited with giving birth to meteor science after the 1833 Leonid meteor shower over North America spurred him to study this phenomenon. He was born in East Hartford, Conn., and in 1813 graduated from Yale University where he acted as college tutor from 1815-17. In the latter year he was appointed to the chair of chemistry, mineralogy and geology in the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. A gold rush in North Carolina led to the sponsorship of the first state geological survey ever attempted in the US and Olmsted travelled on horseback across the state collecting minerals and fossils, publishing his geological map in 1825. In that year he became professor of mathematics and natural philosophy at Yale, publishing an elaborate theory of hail-stones in 1830 that provoked much discussion but finally received the general approbation of meteorologists. The meteor shower of 1833 inspired him to study their history and behaviour until he was able to satisfactorily demonstrate their cosmical origin, and in 1835 he and his associate Elias Loomis became the first American investigators to observe Halleys Comet. In 1836 his Yale professorship was divided and he retained that of natural philosophy, carrying out a series of observations of the aurora borealis over several years. Olmsted wrote a number of textbooks on Natural Philosophy and Astronomy which sold well, although he remains known in the scientific world chiefly for his observations on hail, meteors and the aurora borealis. Letters on Astronomy was first published in 1840 and is reprinted from the revised edition of 1851 which includes numerous diagrams integrated with the text. Presented as a series of letters to a female friend, subjects covered include astronomical instruments and observatories, the seasons, tides, gravity, the planets, meteors, and biographical sketches of figures such as Newton, Copernicus, and Galileo.
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