SIMON NEWCOMB.* 
[With 1 plate.] 
By ORMOND STONE. 
Simon Newcomb was a unique figure in American science.’ Per- 
haps no other great American scientist was so many sided, no other, 
who approached him in versatility, stood at or so near the head in 
various departments of science. He was mathematician; celestial 
mechanician; astronomical observer, computer, and_ statistician; 
fundamental star cataloguer; author of memoirs on the lunar theory, 
of planetary tables, of books on popular astronomy, of mathematical 
school and college texts, of books on economics; novelist ; president of 
a society for psychical research ! 
Simon Newcomb was born March 12, 1835, in Wallace, a village of 
Nova Scotia, but he was of New England descent. At the age of 17 
he went to Salem, Massachusetts, and later to Maryland, where he 
taught school for several years. When 22 he became assistant in the 
Nautical Almanac office, then located at Cambridge, Massachusetts, 
ond also a student in the Lawrence Scientific School, where he later 
graduated as bachelor of science. At the age of 25 he received an 
appointment as professor of mathematics, United States Navy, and 
was assigned to duty in the Naval Observatory in Washington. Six- 
teen years later he was placed in charge of the Nautical Almanac 
office, which had been removed to Washington, and of which he 
remained director from 1877 until 1897, when, having reached the age 
of 62, he was placed on the retired list. He continued to reside in 
Washington until he died, July 12, 1909. Upon the death of Pro- 
fessor Winlock, in 1875, he was offered but declined the directorship 
of the Harvard Observatory. From 1884 to 1894 to his duties in the 
4 Reprinted by permission from Astrophysical Journal, vol. 30, No. 3, October, 
1909. 
>The portrait of Professor Newcomb, reproduced herewith, is from a photo- 
graph made in 1897 by Mr. A. D. Wyatt, of Brattleboro, Vermont. It therefore 
represents Professor Newcomb at the age of 62, in the year of his retirement 
from active service in the Navy Department.—Ebs. 
237 
