Figure 9. — Refracting telescope, comet seeker, (USNM 317027) bvHenry Fitz, 8}^-inch aperture, 61 -inch 

 tube, fitted for equatorial mounting. The stand is lacking. {Smithsonian photo 4681 j) 



Although he saved money, his work did not bring 

 him the financial or other rewards that he had hoped 

 for. In spring of 1839 he appears to have worked as 

 a speculum maker with Wolcott and others — one of 

 them may have been his acquaintance John Johnson — 

 and to have read of Daguerre's work in photography. 

 To learn more of these experiments, as well as to 

 inquire into optics and optical glass, he sailed to 

 Europe in August of that year, taking passage by 

 steerage. 



He returned to New York in November 1839 and 

 in that month, according to the testimony of his son 

 Harry, made a portrait with a camera invented by 

 Wolcott. This camera portrait he believed to be the 

 first ever made. In 1840, after more experimenting, 

 he set up a studio in Baltimore, where his father was 

 then living, and spent several years there "taking 

 likenesses." At the same time he continued to work 

 with telescopes and lenses. His first refractors were 

 built there, instruments he later referred to as crude 

 affairs. 



While in Baltimore he took a step which marks 

 the beginning of the final phase of his career. In 

 June 1844 he married Julia Ann Wells of Southold, 

 Long Island, whom he had known for about a decade 

 and with whom he had long corresponded. Julia 



was a woman of unusual ability and personality, 

 less scientific than he but more literary and artistic, 

 and no less intelligent. With her to encourage him, 

 he continued his experiments in telescope building. 

 A year after their marriage they moved to New York, 

 where he was to spend the remainder of his life. 



That summer he prepared a 6-inch refracting 

 telescope for exhibition at the Fair of the American 

 Institute, held annually in New York. This carefully 

 constructed instrument, with its ingenious tripod and 

 its achromatic objective — which he had made him- 

 self, correcting the curves by a process of his own 

 invention — won the highest award of the Fair, a gold 

 medal. It was the first of many such medals he 

 was to earn. His telescope also received favorable 

 notice from scientists and astronomers, among them 

 Lewis M. Rutherfurd, a wealthy New Yorker and 

 trustee of Columbia College. Rutherfurd immediately 

 ordered a 4-inch refractor for his own observatory. 

 His interest and example soon brought orders from 

 others. 



From this time on, Henry Fitz devoted most of his 

 energies to building telescopes. Cameras were not 

 altogether abandoned. He continued to make them 

 and to instruct others in their use. He invented a 

 camera lens that was patented posthumously. He 

 was one of the founders of the American Photo- 



168 



BULLETIN 228: CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE MUSEUM OF HISTORY AND TECHNOLOGY 



