264 
REPORT OF THE ANNUAL MEETING 
A report was received from the Trustees of the Watson Fund, signed by 
A. 0. Leuschner (Chairman), W. L. Elkins, and G. C. Comstock, stating that 
grants Nos. 16-17 (as announced below, p. 273) were recommended. Re- 
ports on previous grants were as follows: 
No. 14, John A. Miller, Sproul Observatory, Swarthmore College, is expending his ap- 
propriation for the services of an assistant in parallax determinations. A list of 50 paral- 
laxes, together with a list of observations and reductions, has been published. A second list 
of 50 should be ready before the beginning of January, 1919. 
No. 15, Herbert C. Wilson, Goodsell Observatory, Northfield, Minn., is expending the 
appropriation for the services of an assistant in measuring and reducing photographic plates 
of asteroids for position and magnitude. The measurement and reduction of 97 plates has 
been completed. For 71, the results are published in Pub. Goodsell Obs., Northfield, Minn., 
No. 5. Of the 26 unpublished measures, 15 are of plates of seven Watson Asteroids. A 
highly satisfactory color screen suitable for the 16-inch telescope has been made by R. 
J. Wallace, Research Laboratories of the Cramer Dry Plate Company. 
A report was received from the Committee on the Henry Draper Fund, 
signed by W. W. Campbell (Chairman), as follows: 
No awards have been made in the past year: the reduced size of many observatory and lab- 
oratory staffs, because of war activities, has not permitted normal development of new meth- 
ods in astrophysics, and there have been no urgent calls for special instruments. 
A grant of $500 made to W. W. Campbell two years ago, to provide the mounting of an 
ultra-violet spectrograph for use with the Crossley reflecting telescope, was expended, and the 
finished instrument was described in Lick. Obs. Bull., Berkeley, No. 291, in May, 1917. This 
instrument has been used by Mr. Wright in photographing the spectra of all the brighter 
planetary nebulae in the northern two-thirds of the sky. 
A grant of $300 made in April, 1917, to Professor Joel Stebbins, of the University of 
Illinois, and a similar grant in like amount made earlier, are being applied, in accordance 
with agreement, in payment of part-time salary of an assistant to Dr. Stebbins in order to 
further the latter's development of the photo-electric cell photometer and the application 
to the study of variable stars. Quoting from Professor Stebbins' report dated April, 1918: 
"The photo-electric photometer has been improved until it is now from ten to twenty times 
as sensitive as the selenium photometer. We can measure the brightness of stars three 
magnitudes fainter than those which it was possible to observe with the selenium instru- 
ment. About a dozen new bright variable stars have been discovered, of which eight have 
been announced at meetings of the American Astronomical Society. We are also carrying 
on studies of several known variables." In further agreement with the terms of the grant, 
the University of Illinois has arranged to continue the assistant on full time in Professor 
Stebbins's department after the close of the present academic year. 
A report was received from the Committee on the J. Lawrence Smith Fund, 
signed by E. W. Morley (Chairman), stating that the Fund now has a cash 
balance of income of $1188.85 and a balance of invested income amounting to 
$1532.50, recommending grants No. 9 (as announced below, p. 274), and 
containing the following reports on previous grants : 
No. 3, Edmund O. Hovey, American Museum of Natural History, New York, received in 
1909 a grant of $400 to aid in the study of certain meteorites. The pressure of adminstra- 
