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© 2011 University of Chicago Library
The Edward Emerson Barnard Papers were processed and preserved with support from the John Crerar Foundation.
The collection is open for research.
When quoting material from this collection, the preferred citation is: Barnard. Edward Emerson. Papers,[Box #, Folder #], Hanna Holborn Gray Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library
Edward Emerson Barnard was born in Nashville, Tennessee December 16th 1857. His father died before his birth, leaving the family in poverty. Barnard’s mother directed his education, and at the age of nine, he began working in a photographic studio.
In 1876, Barnard purchased a 5-inch (130 mm) refractor telescope and a basic astronomy book and taught himself observational astronomy. In 1881 he discovered the first of many comets. That same year he married Rhoda Calvert. In 1883, he received a fellowship to Vanderbilt University, graduating in mathematics in 1887. He was also an instructor at Vanderbilt during his studies.
In 1887 Barnard moved to California to work at the University of California’s new Lick Observatory. In 1892, he made the first photographic discovery of a comet. That same year Barnard discovered the fifth moon of Jupiter. He won the Gold Medal of Britain’s Royal Astronomical Society in 1897 for his research on the Milky Way, featured in A Photographic Atlas of Selected Regions of the Milky Way (1927).
In 1895 Barnard joined the faculty of the University of Chicago as a Professor of Practical Astronomy working first at the Kenwood Observatory, then at the newly constructed Yerkes Observatory, in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin.
A pioneering astrophotographer, Barnard cataloged a series of dark nebula, giving them numerical designations beginning with Barnard 1 and ending with Barnard 370. He published his initial list with a 1919 paper in the Astrophysical Journal, "On the Dark Markings of the Sky with a Catalogue of 182 such Objects".
Barnard died on February 6, 1923 in Williams Bay, Wisconsin, and was buried in Nashville.
The Edward Emerson Barnard Papers are divided into three series. Series I: Notes, Observations and Calculations contains bound notebooks holding published and unpublished articles and observation notes, along with extensive unbound files of observations and calculations, catalogued by astronomical object.
Series II contains draft speeches, and Barnard's first astronomy book, and Series III includes oversized charts and data sheets.
This series is divided into five subseries. Subseries 1 contains notebooks from Barnard’s days at Vanderbilt University. Subseries 2 contains copies of Barnard’s Lick Observatory Notebooks. The copying of the notebooks was commissioned by Barnard himself and an explanatory note can be found in the first notebook. Subseries 3, 4 and 5 contain three different series of notebooks used by Barnard at Yerkes Observatory, organized either chronologically or by astronomical topic.
This series includes drafts of various Barnard speeches and as well as his first astronomy book.