William Parsons, 3rd Earl of Rosse
William Parsons, 3rd Earl of Rosse

Author: R. Charles Mollan

Publisher: Manchester University Press

Published: 2015-11-01

Total Pages: 380

ISBN-13: 1526101939

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This is a revealing account of the family life and achievements of the Third Earl of Rosse, a hereditary peer and resident landlord at Birr Castle, County Offaly, in nineteenth-century Ireland, before, during and after the devastating famine of the 1840s. He was a remarkable engineer, who built enormous telescopes in the cloudy middle of Ireland. The book gives details, in an attractive non-technical style which requires no previous scientific knowledge, of his engineering initiatives and the astronomical results, but also reveals much more about the man and his contributions – locally in the town and county around Birr, in political and other functions in an Ireland administered by the Protestant Ascendancy, in the development and activities of the Royal Society, of which he was President from 1848–54, and the British Association for the Advancement of Science. The Countess of Rosse, who receives full acknowledgement in the book, was a woman of many talents, among which was her pioneering work in photography, and the book includes reproductions of her artistic exposures, and many other attractive illustrations.

Great Astronomers: William Parsons
Great Astronomers: William Parsons

Author: Robert Stawell Ball

Publisher:

Published: 2017-06-04

Total Pages: 25

ISBN-13: 9781521436127

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William Parsons, the 3rd Earl of Rosse, (1800-1867) was an Anglo-Irish astronomer who made several large telescopes. His 72-inch telescope, the "Leviathan", built in 1845, was the world's largest telescope until the early 20th century.The 72-inch (1.8 m) telescope replaced a 36-inch (910 mm) telescope that he had built previously. He had to invent many of the techniques he used for constructing the Leviathan, both because its size was without precedent and because earlier telescope builders had guarded their secrets or had simply failed to publish their methods. Rosse's telescope was considered a marvelous astronomical and engineering achievement.Lord Rosse performed astronomical studies and discovered the spiral nature of some nebulas. He named the Crab Nebula. A main component of Rosse's nebular research was attempting to resolve the nebular hypothesis, which posited that planets and stars were formed by gravity acting on gaseous nebulae.(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Parsons,_3rd_Earl_of_Rosse)

Great Astronomers William Parsons (3rd Earl of Rosse)
Great Astronomers William Parsons (3rd Earl of Rosse)

Author: Robert Stawell Ball

Publisher:

Published: 2020-06-28

Total Pages: 32

ISBN-13:

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William Parsons, the 3rd Earl of Rosse (1800-1867) was an Anglo-Irish astronomer who made several large telescopes. His 72-inch telescope, the "Leviathan", built in 1845, was the world's largest telescope until the early 20th century.The 72-inch (1.8 m) telescope replaced a 36-inch (910 mm) telescope that he had built previously. He had to invent many of the techniques he used for constructing the Leviathan, both because its size was without precedent and because earlier telescope builders had guarded their secrets or had simply failed to publish their methods. Rosse's telescope was considered a marvelous astronomical and engineering achievement.Lord Rosse performed astronomical studies and discovered the spiral nature of some nebula. He named the Crab Nebula. A main component of Rosse's nebular research was attempting to resolve the nebular hypothesis, which posited that planets and stars were formed by gravity acting on gaseous nebulae.

Unveiling Galaxies
Unveiling Galaxies

Author: Jean-René Roy

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2018

Total Pages: 311

ISBN-13: 1108417019

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A thought provoking study of the powerful impact of images in guiding astronomers' understanding of galaxies through time.

Observing by Hand
Observing by Hand

Author: Omar W. Nasim

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 2014-01-06

Total Pages: 313

ISBN-13: 022608440X

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Today we are all familiar with the iconic pictures of the nebulae produced by the Hubble Space Telescope’s digital cameras. But there was a time, before the successful application of photography to the heavens, in which scientists had to rely on handmade drawings of these mysterious phenomena. Observing by Hand sheds entirely new light on the ways in which the production and reception of handdrawn images of the nebulae in the nineteenth century contributed to astronomical observation. Omar W. Nasim investigates hundreds of unpublished observing books and paper records from six nineteenth-century observers of the nebulae: Sir John Herschel; William Parsons, the third Earl of Rosse; William Lassell; Ebenezer Porter Mason; Ernst Wilhelm Leberecht Tempel; and George Phillips Bond. Nasim focuses on the ways in which these observers created and employed their drawings in data-driven procedures, from their choices of artistic materials and techniques to their practices and scientific observation. He examines the ways in which the act of drawing complemented the acts of seeing and knowing, as well as the ways that making pictures was connected to the production of scientific knowledge. An impeccably researched, carefully crafted, and beautifully illustrated piece of historical work, Observing by Hand will delight historians of science, art, and the book, as well as astronomers and philosophers.