WILLIAM CRANCH BOND. 



1789-1859. 



IN seconding the obituary resolutions of the American 

 Academy of Arts and Sciences on the first director of the Har- 

 vard College Observatory, ex-President Quincy used these 

 words : " It is not too much to say that the extent of his 

 knowledge, the winning urbanity of his manners, and his ex- 

 emplary exactness in life and as an observer, in a great de- 

 gree effected the attainment of those large means and increased 

 powers which ultimately raised to its present prosperous state 

 the observatory over which through subsequent life he watched, 

 and which he left at death honoured and improved by his 

 labours and genius." Let us briefly trace the career which 

 could deserve such a testimonial. 



William Cranch Bond was born in Portland, Me., Septem- 

 ber 9, 1789, being the youngest son in a family of several chil- 

 dren. His parents, Hannah (Cranch) and William Bond, were 

 natives of England and were married there. The Bond family 

 can be traced to the time of William the Conqueror, by whom 

 Brandon Manor is said to have been granted to the contem- 

 porary ancestor of that line. William Bond was born in Plym- 

 outh, and became a clockmaker and silversmith. Having been 

 induced to emigrate to America, he located at Portland, then 

 called Falmouth, and engaged in cutting ship timber which he 

 sent to England. In a short time he brought over his family, 

 but the timber business not proving successful, he removed to 

 Boston in 1793 and took up again his former occupation. His 

 shop stood on one of the two corners of Milk and Marlboro 

 (now Washington) Streets, the other being occupied by the Old 

 South Church. William C. Bond was then a Boston boy from 

 the age of four years. He had little opportunity to attend 

 school, for the circumstances of the family, as he afterward 

 told Josiah Quincy, " obliged me to become an apprentice to 



