Florence Cushman

Harvard Computers and their boss Edward Charles Pickering on May 13, 1913 in front of Building C of the Harvard College Observatory: back row from left to right: Margaret Harwood, Mollie O'Reilly, Edward Charles Pickering, Edith Gill, Annie Jump Cannon, Evelyn Lland, Florence Cushman, Marion Whyte, Grace Brooks; front row left to right: Arville Walker, possibly Johanna Mackie, Alta Carpenter, Mabel Gill, Ida Woods.

Florence Cushman (* 1860 in Boston , Massachusetts ; † 1940 ) was an American astronomer . She worked at the Harvard College Observatory and was a contributor to the Henry Draper Catalog .

Life

Cushman graduated from Charlestown High School in 1877. In 1888 she began working for Edward Charles Pickering at the Harvard College Observatory. Cushman was one of the Harvard computers who worked for Pickering. When Pickering died in 1919, Cushman then worked for Annie Jump Cannon , who took over the management of the observatory. Until 1937 she was an astronomer at this observatory.

job

During her time at the observatory, she analyzed, classified, and cataloged hundreds of thousands of stars. In the late 19th century, the photographic revolution made detailed analysis of the stars possible for the first time. In order to obtain evaluable optical spectra of selected stars (or galaxies ) , photographers at the observatory exposed glass photo plates at night . During the bright times of the day, computers like Cushman analyzed the optical spectra stored photographically on these photo plates and cataloged the results. These results are e.g. B. to be found in the Henry Draper catalog.

Web links

Harvard College Observatory History in Images at harvard.edu
The pioneering women who helped us picture the stars | Cosmos on cosmosmagazine.com
Computers at Work: Astronomical labor at the HCO at the turn of the century | Galactic Gazette on altbibl.io
The first women astronomers | scipolicyeu on wordpress.com
Annie Jump Cannon - Career on wellesley.edu

Individual evidence

↑ The Female Astronomers Who Captured the Stars on sciencefriday.com
^ Ogilvie, Marilyn Bailey: Women in science: antiquity through the nineteenth century: a biographical dictionary with annotated bibliography . MIT Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, ISBN 978-0-262-65038-0 , pp. 181 .
↑ Computers at Work: Astronomical labor at the HCO at the turn of the century | Galactic Gazette on altbibl.io

personal data
SURNAME	Cushman, Florence
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	American astronomer, Harvard computer
DATE OF BIRTH	1860
PLACE OF BIRTH	Boston , Massachusetts
DATE OF DEATH	1940

[1] The Female Astronomers Who Captured the Stars on sciencefriday.com

[2] Ogilvie, Marilyn Bailey: Women in science: antiquity through the nineteenth century: a biographical dictionary with annotated bibliography . MIT Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, ISBN 978-0-262-65038-0 , pp. 181 .

[3] Computers at Work: Astronomical labor at the HCO at the turn of the century | Galactic Gazette on altbibl.io