Matthew Fontaine Maury, the Pathfinder of the SeasLewis, Charles Lee
History
Matthew Fontaine Maury, the Pathfinder of the Seas
Lewis, Charles Lee
Maury, Matthew Fontaine, 1806-1873
Immediately after becoming superintendent, Maury moved the depot to
a building between 24th and 25th Streets, N. W., known formerly as
2222–24 Pennsylvania Avenue, and to the rather limited accommodations
here he brought his family. Meanwhile a new building was being
constructed on a reservation at 23d and E Streets, N. W., where
the Naval Medical School is now located,—a site covering about
seventeen acres which had been reserved by General Washington for a
great university. This new building was to be of brick, in the form
of a square about 50 feet by 50, surmounted by a dome 23 feet in
diameter, with wings to the south, east, and west. Later, in 1847, the
superintendent’s residence was constructed and connected with the main
building by an extension of the east wing.
[Illustration:
AN ENGRAVING OF THE UNITED STATES NAVAL OBSERVATORY BUILDINGS AS
THEY APPEARED WHEN MAURY WAS SUPERINTENDENT ABOUT 1845
From an engraving in the title page of “Astronomical and
Meteorological Observations Made during the Year 1875, at the U. S.
Naval Observatory,” 1878.]
The name of the institution varied. As the Depot of Charts and
Instruments it was officially known from 1830 to 1844; but for the
next ten years the names Naval Observatory and National Observatory
were used indiscriminately, sometimes even in the same publication.
In December, 1854, the Secretary of the Navy instructed that it
should henceforth be called the United States Naval Observatory and
Hydrographical Office, and as such it was known until the establishment
of the Hydrographic Office as a separate division in 1866. Since that
date the official name of the institution has been the United States
Naval Observatory.
Near the close of September, 1844, the Observatory was reported to be
completed, and on October 1 Maury was ordered to take charge with a
staff of line officers and professors of mathematics of the navy, and
civilian professors. Lieutenant James M. Gilliss, Maury’s predecessor,
had been greatly interested in astronomy, especially that field of
the science having to do with navigation, and it was largely through
his exertions that the necessary legislation had been passed making
possible a building, adapted not merely to the housing of charts and
instruments but suitable as well for astronomical observations. He had
been sent to Europe to consult about the purchasing of instruments for
the new Observatory, and there were those who thought that he should
have been made its first superintendent.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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