3o8 Memorial of George Brown Goode. 



ries had been placed in the principal capitals of Europe, as a national 

 object of scientific ornament, as well as a means for nourishing science in 

 general, Hassler conceded that it might there be placed, since it would 

 then be the proper place for the deposit of the standards of weights and 

 measures, which also makes a special part the collection of instruments. 

 James Monroe, when Secretar}' of State, in 1812, strongly urged upon 

 Congress the establishment of an observatory, urging, first, the necessity 

 of establishing a first meridian for the continent, and, in the second 

 place, the fact that every enlightened nation had already established such 

 an institution of learning. The immediate occasion for the intervention 

 of the Secretary of State was the memorial of William lyambert, of Vir- 

 ginia, which was presented at various times from 18 10 to 182 1, and was 

 accompanied by an elaborate report in 1822. 



The action of Congress during the Adams Administration has been 

 referred to. In 1830 Mr. Branch, of North Carolina, Secretary of the 

 Navy under Jackson, strongly urged the establishment of an observatory 

 for general astronomical purposes. 



The beginning of the observatory seems to have beeii actually made 

 on Capitol Hill during Mr. Adams's Administration, imder instruction 

 of Astronomers I^ambert and Elliott, employed by Congress to determine 

 the longitude of Washington. The President, in his diary of 1825, 

 described a visit to Capitol Hill in company with Colonel Roberdeau, and 

 spoke of witnessing an observation of the passage of the sun over the 

 meridian, made with a small transit instrument. This instrument was 

 very probably the one obtained by Hassler in Europe in 18 15, which he 

 never was permitted to use in connection with the Coast Survey work, 

 and which passed into the hands of Eieutenant Wilkes in 1834, when it 

 was placed in the small observatory, erected at his own expense, about 

 a thousand feet north of the Dome of the Capitol. 



It was at this establishment, which was known as the Naval Depot of 

 Instruments, that the 5 -foot transit was used, mainh- for the purpose of 

 reading the naval chronometer. When Wilkes went to sea with his 

 expedition in 1837, Lieutenant James M. Gilliss became superintendent of 

 the depot, and having obtained a 42-inch astronomical telescope, com- 

 menced a series of observations on the culmination of the moon aiid stars. 

 In 1842 the establishment of a permanent depot of charts and instruments 

 was authorized by Congress, and although the establishment of an observ- 

 atory was not authorized in the bill, every effort was made by Lieuten- 

 ant Gilliss and others interested in his work to secure suitable acconuno- 

 dations for astronomical work, and his plans having been approved by 

 President Tyler, work was begun on the Naval Observatory, now known 

 as the National Observator5^ 



There can be little doubt that the excellence of the work done by Gil- 

 liss himself, with his limited opportunrties, did nuich to hasten the estab- 

 lishment of the observatory, and there is in this connection a traditional 



