436 JONATHAN INGERSOLL BOWDITCH. 



friends of science. After liis father's death in 1838, Mr. Bowditch 

 assumed the editorship of frequent successive editions of " The Prac- 

 tical Navigator," making such corrections and new calculations as 

 were needed, until the copyright was purchased by the United States 

 government, and so became public property. 



Mr. Bowditch erected a private astronomical observatory in connec- 

 tion with his summer residence at Canton, and for many years made 

 there observations of celestial phenomena, while he kept at the same 

 time a full meteorological register. He early interested himself in the 

 Observatory of Harvard College. He was the fellow townsman and 

 the early and lifelong friend of Benjamin Peirce, the first Professor of 

 Astronomy in the University, and was in intimate association with both 

 the Bonds and with Professor Winlock, Professor Pickering is of his 

 near kindred ; but Mr. Bowditch, though fully aware of his scientific 

 talents and attainments, hesitated to recommend him for his present 

 office, on the ground that he had never made a specialty of astronomy, 

 and withdrew his objections only when persuaded that the training of 

 an accomplished physicist implies an ability in the invention, improve- 

 ment, and direction of instruments and methods of ob-ervation which 

 the mere scientific knowledge of astronomy cannot furnish, — a propo- 

 sition which, if it needs proof, is abundantly demonstrated in the 

 recent history and present condition of the Harvard Observatory. 

 Mr. Bowditch was for many years a member of the committee ap- 

 pointed by the Overseers of the College for visiting the Observatory, 

 and rendered important aid to its administration, especially in the in- 

 vestment and increase of its funds, to which he was himself a generous 

 contributor, and for which he secured in many instances donations and 

 annual subscriptions. He took an equally active and beneficent inter- 

 est in various other departments and enterprises of the University, — 

 in the erection of Memorial Hall, in the establishment of the Scientific 

 Museum, and in the various improvements that have been made in the 

 Medical and in the Divinity School. He was among the efficient pro- 

 moters of the plan of furnishing cheap board for poor students, which 

 resulted in the erection and furnishing of a large and commodious 

 dining hall by the munificence of the late Nathaniel Thayer, and was 

 superseded only by the ample provision of board at cost for several 

 hundred students in Memorial Hall. The University recognized at 

 once Mr. Bowditch's long and varied services, and his claim to high 

 regard for scholarly and scientific attainments, by conferring on him 

 the degree of Master of Arts in 1849, and that of Doctor of Laws on 

 its two hundred and fiftieth anniversary, in 1887. 



