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Charles Weston Danforth
BA: Swarthmore College MA: Johns Hopkins University PhD Johns Hopkins University Thesis Advisor: William P. Blair Other Info: Like some of my 'ancestors', I am an avid mountain climber and spectroscopist. The first is purely coincidental. |
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William P. Blair
BA: Olivet College, MI 1975 MS: University of Michigan, 1977 PhD: University of Michigan, 1981 Thesis Advisor: Robert P. Kirshner (confirmed by Blair and Kirshner) Other Info: Currently at JHU. Research interests include supernova remnants and cataclysmic variable stars. Bill was involved in the Astro 1 and Astro 2 missions, was the head of Science Operations for the FUSE mission, and is now involved in JWST planning. |
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Robert P. Kirshner
BA: Harvard College, 1970 PhD: CalTech, 1974 Thesis Advisor: J. Bev Oke (confirmed by Oke and Kirshner) Other Info: Currently at Harvard where he was the Department Chair from 1990-97. Interests include SN, SNRs, galaxy dynamics, evolution and large-scale distribution. Kirshner's other students (my adademic uncles) are (from Kirshner): Harvard University |
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John Beverly Oke
BA: 1948, MA: 1950 University of Toronto PhD: Princeton University, 1953 Died: March 3, 2004, Victoria, BC Thesis Advisor: Lyman Spitzer, Jr. (confirmed by Oke) Other Info: Faculty at Toronto (1953-58) and Caltech (1958-2004). Associate Director Hale Observatories (Palomar, Mt. Wilson) 1970-78. |
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Lyman Spitzer, Jr
BA: Yale University, 1935 MA: Cambridge ? PhD: Princeton University, 1938 Died: March 31, 1997, Princeton, NJ Thesis Advisor: Henry Norris Russell Other Info: Spitzer was certainly one of the biggest names in 20th century astronomy. He is creditted with founding the Princeton Plasma Physics Lab and, in 1946, envisioning the Hubble Space Telescope. Spitzer was also an avid mountaineer and alpinist. There are both a Spitzer Fellowship (for astrophysics) and a Spitzer Grant (for mountaineering). His other students included George B. Field* and J. Michael Shull. Other Bios: by Leon Mestel, by R. D. Hazeltine, Princeton Univ. |
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Henry Norris Russell
BA: Princeton University, 1897 PhD: Princeton University, 1900: "An analysis of the way that Mars perturbs the orbit of the asteroid Eros" Died: Feb. 18, 1957, Princeton, N.J. Thesis Advisor: Charles Augustus Young Other Info: Russell is perhaps most famous in astronomical circles for codiscovering the color-magnitude relationship in stellar astronomy and devising what has become known as the Hertzsprung-Russell diagram. Russell was also an avid mountain climber. His more famous students included Harlow Shapley (1913), Dunham, Donald H. Menzel (1924), F. B. Wood, and fellow Swarthmore Graduate C. E. M. Sitterly. |
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Charles Augustus Young
Born: December 15, 1834 Died: January 3, 1908 Hanover, NH BA: Dartmouth College 1853 Academic Advisor: ? Other Info: Young was an authority on the sun and a pioneer in spectroscopy. The day he died, there was a total solar eclipse. His students included Edwin B. Frost (1887?), Dayton C. Miller (1890). As far as I know, Young never received a doctorate and it is unclear who he worked under. But it is likely he received much of his early training from his father and maternal grandfather, both of whom were professors of natural philosophy at Dartmouth. He moved to Princeton in 1877. |