Katherine Dagley

ESSAY: KATHERINE DAGLEY

TO INFINITY AND BEYOND : A HISTORY OF NOTABLE WOMEN IN ASTRONOMY

Most people know the names associated with astrophysical and astronomical discoveries such as Hubble and Herschel, but few know that most of the work and calculations behind these men’s discoveries were done by women. In a time where women had few rights, opportunities, or abilities to hold important jobs, a group of hidden figures worked for under seven dollars an hour analyzing charts, logging calculations, and discovering new scientific methods every day. This all took place at Harvard College Observatory, where for years, women “calculators,” as they were called, were making groundbreaking observations every day. They logged their data of over 500,000 stellar observations in thousands of notebooks, which have been forgotten over the years. In an attempt to bring back both the observations and the legacies of these forgotten women astronomers, Harvard created Project PHaEDRA (Preserving Harvard’s Early Data and Research in Astronomy) to digitize this collection of data through volunteer transcription and analysis. Their goal is to recognize significant contributions to astronomy regardless of gender and to create a more diverse and fuller understanding of who contributed to astrophysics (Margolis). Through partnership with this organization and the Smithsonian Institute, volunteers serve by revitalizing forgotten legacies of important women and by ensuring that future generations have free access to this invaluable data.

The Harvard Observatory has a long and rich history since its founding, with some of the most important discoveries there done by women. The institute began hiring women in 1875, although some women, like Eliza Quincy, began volunteering their time much earlier than that. The earliest women to officially work at the observatory were RT Rogers, RG Saunders, and Anna Winlock, who assisted William Rogers in his study of time zones (Wolbach Library). The main task for these scientists was to analyze glass plate photographs of star alignments, discovering, cataloging, and researching hundreds of thousands of celestial beings. The women tended to work in pairs of observers and recorders, using their studies in astronomy and astrophysics to help them classify and observe these stars. Despite their extensive studies and knowledge in astronomy, they weren’t recognized as “astronomers,” instead assigned the title of human “computers.” Also, even though they had completed all of the necessary coursework to earn degrees in astronomy, the Harvard College Observatory still denied them a degree or title. Despite these challenges, however, many of the women went on to earn PhDs in Astronomy. Their jobs were tiring, highly skilled, and required long hours, yet these women earned only 40% of what men doing similar jobs made, making only 25 cents (approximately 6.38 in modern dollars) for every grueling hour (Margolis). They justified this unequal pay by deskilling women’s jobs, despite the fact that most of the intricate calculations were made by women. Thanks to the work, persistence, and organization of a few extremely smart women, many of astronomy’s most famous calculations, laws, and discoveries happened within the walls of the Harvard College Observatory.

The Harvard College Observatory is credited with hiring some of the most notable names in astronomy, such as Willamina Fleming. From working as a chambermaid to

making her own scientific law, Fleming is an inspiration to women and her work alone is motivation enough to keep the records of the Harvard College Observatory alive. In 1879, Willamina Fleming was hired not as a scientist, but a housemaid. When she was first hired, she was pregnant and had just been abandoned by her husband, so she sought menial work as a housekeeper to stay afloat. A few months after working under Pickering, the supervisor, he began to notice that she was highly intelligent and hired her as a part time computer. Being the fast learner and hard worker she was, Fleming was soon appointed to supervise and lead all of the women computers. She even developed the Henry Draper Catalogue (Draper was one of the founding male astronomers of the Harvard College Observatory), and was appointed as the first curator of astronomical photographs in 1899 (Harvard Library). Among many other groundbreaking accomplishments, Fleming developed a common and universal system for classifying stars, assigning each star a letter based on the hydrogen content that could be observed in their spectra, A having the most hydrogen, B having the next highest amount, and so on. She also discovered the Horsehead Nebula in 1888 and published A Photographic Study of Nebula Stars and Spectra and Photographic Magnitudes of Stars in Standard Regions. In 1906, she became the first American woman to be named an honorary member of the Royal Astronomical Society of London. She was appointed honorary fellow in astronomy at Wellesley College, since Harvard would not grant her the astronomy degree during her time working as a computer (Scientific Women). Fleming was an inspiration and proved that women can do anything they put their mind to regardless of sex and socioeconomic status, two hurdles that Fleming overcame with the simply using the immense power of her brain.

Another notable name in astronomy was Henrietta Leavitt, who was hired as a leading computer on the solar sequence project at the observatory. She was partially deaf, extremely shy, and an incredible thinker. Her task was to search for variable stars using the glass plate photographs taken at different times, one on top of the other, in a method called superposition. On these glass plates, she studied nebulae, and eventually made the discovery that they were individual galaxies as opposed to one cohesive mass (Harvard Library). She also discovered that some stars have a consistent brightness regardless of their location, which allowed her to precisely calculate their distance from Earth instead of merely guessing, as people had in the past (Howell). She was even credited as “the woman who discovered how to measure the universe” by George Johnson, author of Miss Leavitt’s Stars (Mariani). A few years after she completed her work on measurement, Edwin Hubble, who created the Hubble Space Telescope, used all of Leavitt’s information and calculations to help him understand the distance to the Andromeda Galaxy. These measurements, all based on Leavitt’s work, led him to his famous discovery: that the universe is constantly expanding. Another male astronomer, Harlow Shapley, also used Leavitt’s research to calculate distances around the Milky Way, without crediting Leavitt for her contribution. Yet another famous astronomer, Pickering, who worked at the observatory, published Leavitt’s work under his own name. Sadly, brilliant women like Leavitt were often overshadowed and taken advantage of by their male counterparts, who saw no wrong in passing their work off as their own (Howell). The American Association of Variable Star Observers writes on Leavitt’s shy nature, saying “Hers was a shy and somewhat unassuming personality, and women at that time, even highly educated and brilliantly talented women who in a

fairer world would have been respected as equals by their male peers, were all too often resigned to taking a lesser role, and were often just quietly grateful to be given any sort of role at all” (Mariani). Despite her shyness and inability to stand up to the plagiarizers, she was eventually given credit for her own work and even nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize (Howell). Her discoveries were later named Leavitt’s Law, which states “‘a straight line can readily be drawn among each of the two series of points corresponding to maxima and minima, thus showing that there is a simple relation between the brightness of the variables and their periods.’ In other words, there is a linear relationship between a star’s true brightness or intrinsic luminosity and the logarithm of its period” (Maxwell). Leavitt is yet another example of a brilliantly powerful woman living in a time when they were required to work in the shadows and behind the scenes while their male counterparts received the accolades. She fueled the discoveries of many keystone scientific principles and should have been more widely recognized as an ingenious astronomer.

There are countless other women who contributed to groundbreaking research in the Harvard College Observatory, such as Anna Draper who funded, finished, and published her late husband’s research; Annie Jump Cannon who created the star classification system and published nine volumes of The Draper Catalogue; and Cecelia Payne-Gaposchin, who earned the first official Harvard PhD in Astronomy granted to a woman.

But it is important to reflect on the importance of Project PHaEDRA and the Harvard College Observatory in the modern day. Many of the calculations, discoveries, and star maps are still available in the documents created by women like Fleming, Cannon, and Leavitt, but these astronomers are not well known and their data is not yet available to the public. The Smithsonian, in partnership with the Harvard College Observatory, is providing a service to both these remarkable women of the past and all astronomers of the future by digitizing their life’s work. Project PHaEDRA is keeping the memory of these brilliant scientists alive by finally giving them the credit they deserve. Most calculations done by men have been widely available and celebrated for years, while the women behind their discoveries have been long forgotten. By digitizing and publicizing the work done by these women, project PHaEDRA is beginning to remedy some of the injustices faced by these women while working as underpaid, underrecognized, and underappreciated “calculators,” not astronomers. Project PHaEDRA also provides a service to future generations by providing them a free digitized database of information that includes all of these calculations. Although they were made long ago, these calculations remain relevant and important to modern astrophysics. Also, by familiarizing everybody with names like Leavitt, Fleming, and Cannon, the organization hopes to break down the gender-related stereotypes of scientific discovery to a more modern and inclusive approach.

Diversifying STEM is an important issue, and one of Project PHaEDRA’s main goals is to encourage minorities to participate in science. According to the American Association of University Women, only 28 of those in a STEM career are women. This nonprofit studies women’s involvement in scholarly areas, identifies “fewer role models” as a key factor in the perpetuation of the STEM gender gap (AAUW). This absence of role models isn’t solely due to the lack of notable scientific women. Instead,

it can be partially attributed to the fact that women’s contributions in science have been overlooked by history: an issue directly addressed by Project PHaEDRA. Historically, the gender proportions were much more drastically uneven, as women made up only 8% of the STEM field in 1970 (Carlton). Annie Jump Cannon, a scientist at the Harvard College Observatory, commented on society’s view of women scientists: “A life spent in the routine of science need not destroy the attractive human element of a woman’s nature” (Today in Science). She is essentially saying that, just because a woman is in science, she shouldn’t be looked upon as unladylike, unattractive, or undesirable. Her attempt to normalize the idea of women in STEM is a movement that has extended into the modern day and continues to be an important issue. Women deserve to be fully recognized for their contributions to science, and the best place to begin revitalizing the women in STEM movement is not only by looking forward to the future, but back to the original women contributors to modern science: the calculators at the Harvard College Observatory.

Work cited

”Astronomical Photographic Plate Collection.” Harvard University, platestacks.cfa.harvard.edu/aboutcollection. Accessed 17 Nov. 2021. Carlton, Genevieve. “Women in STEM.” Best Colleges, 3 Sept. 2021, www.bestcolleges.com/resources/ women-in-stem/. Accessed 17 Nov. 2021. “HCO and the Harvard Computers.” Center for Astrophysics, library.cfa.harvard.edu/phaedra/harvardcomputers. Accessed 17 Nov. 2021. Howell, Elizabeth. “Henrietta Swan Leavitt: Discovered How to Measure Stellar Distances.” Space.com, www.space.com/34708-henrietta-swan-leavitt-biography.html. Accessed 17 Nov. 2021. Margolis, Emily A. “The People behind Astronomical Plates and Notebooks: Project PHaEDRA and the

Harvard College Observatory Computers.” Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, 16 May 2021, airandspace.si.edu/stories/editorial/project-phaedra-and-harvard. Accessed 17 Nov. 2021. Mariani, Gael. “Henrietta Leavitt – Celebrating the Forgotten Astronomer.” AAVSO, www.aavso.org/henrietta-leavitt-%E2%80%93-celebrating-forgotten-astronomer. Accessed 17

Nov. 2021. Maxwell, Amanda. “Henrietta Leavitt and the Starlight Distance Key.” Now., Northrop Grumman, 20 Feb. 2018, now.northropgrumman.com/henrietta-leavitt-starlight-distance-key/. Accessed 17 Nov. 2021. “Project PHaEDRA.” Center for Astrophysics, library.cfa.harvard.edu/project-phaedra. Accessed 17 Nov. 2021. “Science Quotes by Annie Jump Cannon.” Today in Science, todayinsci.com/C/Cannon_Annie/

CannonAnnie-Quotations.htm. Accessed 17 Nov. 2021. “The STEM Gap: Women and Girls in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math.” AAUW, www.aauw. org/resources/research/the-stem-gap/. Accessed 17 Nov. 2021. “Willamina Fleming.” History of Scientific Women, scientificwomen.net/women/fleming-williamina-37.

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