/ 



A. 



264 THE $ ^LAR ECLIPSE OF JUL Y 29, 1878. 



contacts, search for planets, and make drawings of the corona. The following 

 party was stationed at Central City, Colorado : Prof. E S. Holden, Lieut. T. W. 

 Very, and Dr. C. S. Hastings. They were assigned to the mountains southwest 

 of Denver, to search for planets, and investigate structure of corona. 



Mr. L. Trouvelot, of Cambridge, Mass., a most skillful artist, accompanied 

 by his son, was sent to Rawlings, Wyoming, to make a drawing of the corona ; 

 Prof. Edison was also at Rawlings. Mr. G. W. Hill, of the Nautical Almanac 

 office, was stationed on one of the mountains in Colorado to make drawings of the 

 corona. Prof. Ormond Stone, of Cincinnati, and Mr. Winslow Upton, of 

 Cambridge, observed the eclipse from the lofty peaks of Colorado, at Schuyler. 

 Gen. Myers and Prof. Abbe, of the Signal Office, and Prof. Langley, of Pitts- 

 burg, were stationed on the summit of Pike's Peak. They were obliged to take 

 their instruments apart and carry them by hand to an elevation exceeding 14,000 

 feet. Mr. D. P. Todd, went to Texas and made arrangements for observing 

 duration of totality near the limits of total eclipse at Dallas and other places. 

 Many distinguished English astronomers and M. Jansen, the famous astronomer from 

 Paris, were also at hand to observe the eclipse. 



Profs. C. A. Young, C. F. Brackett, and C. S. Rockwood, of Princeton, 

 N. J., with Messrs. W. Libbey, Jr., G. H. Calley, C. D. Bennett, W. McDonald 

 C. J. Young, and H. S. S. Smith were near Denver, chiefly working with the 

 spectroscope. Maria Mitchell, of Vassar, was also near Denver. Norman Lockyer* 

 Dr. Schuster, Prof. J. C. Watson, of the Detroit Observatory, and Prof. Thorpe, 

 of England, were in the same neighborhood, with the telespectroscope, and the 

 last named gentleman made a series of meteorological observations at several 

 points. The Chicago Astronomical Society was represented at or near Denver by 

 three of its members, Prof. G. W. Hough, S. W. Burnham, and Prof. E. Colbert. 



As will be seen, the utmost care was taken to select the most favorable points 

 from which the observations could be made unaffected by bad weather or other 

 terrestrial or atmospheric hindrances. Every facility for thorough observation 

 was provided, and the work so divided up among the individual members of each 

 party as to secure from each his undivided attention to the observation of partic- 

 ular features of the great phenomenon, thus securing the fullness and accuracy of 

 detail so important in a scientific point of view. This was the first total solar 

 eclipse that has been visible in this country since that of 1869, which received 

 the attention of our astronomers and was fully observed. The eclipse of 1878 

 may be regarded as a return, or rather as a completion of the cycle of the eclipse 

 of July 18, i860. The dark shadow of the moon first struck the earth in Siberia 

 and crossing Behrings Straits, the line of totality — which covered a space of about 

 116 miles wide — entered the United States at the northwest corner of Montana 

 Territory, and moving in a southeast direction, swept over the Yellowstone Park, 

 through Wyoming Territory, Denver, Colorado, Northern and Eastern Texas, and 

 entering the Gulf of Mexico, between New Orleans and Galveston, crossed the 

 islands of Cuba and San Domingo, and then left the earth. As the line of totality 

 remained so long in this country, there was abundant time to observe all the many 



