12.6 The International Astronomical Union
269
Third, there was the opening speech of the first IAU president, EdouardBenjamin Baillaud (1848–1934) (see Fig. 12.10). In his in memoriam on
Kapteyn, Willem de Sitter wrote::
This modest workshop [the Astronomical Laboratory in Groningen] was the
starting point for the research, which completely changed the appearance of astronomical science. Recently, Arthur Eddington, on the occasion of the Royal
Astronomical Society’s centenary celebration, listed the six most important astronomical events of these hundred years, including: 1904, discovery of two Star
Streams by Kapteyn. And Baillaud, the veteran among astronomers, mentioned
in his opening speech as president of the Congress in Rome in May of this year,
the three things that revolutionized the face of science in the more than fifty years
that he had worked as an active astronomer, and these three were: photography,
the giant telescopes, and the Groningen Laboratory.
The latter is quite an exaggeration. Baillaud himself said (in my translation
from French) [113]:
A new revolution is underway: after the invention of reflective telescopes, spectroscopy and photography, we are now witnessing the arrival of gigantic instruments [...]. These instruments often remain unproductive if they are not
accompanied by all the necessary secondary devices found in an astronomical
laboratory. Since they are photographic plates that need to be studied, these laboratories do not have to be next to the telescopes. The laboratory in Groningen
provides excessive evidence of this.
12.7 The End
Kapteyn and his wife had intended to settle in Hilversum after his retirement.
In preparation for this and to inform themselves as to houses there, they first
temporarily moved in with their eldest daughter and son-in-law Noordenbos;
the latter was now a professor in Amsterdam. Indeed they found a suitable
home in Hilversum, but Kapteyn never lived there. His widow did live in that
house for many years and daughter Henriette moved to the same street after
she separated from Ejnar Hertzsprung in 1923.
Statistically speaking (for more details see my more extensive biography [5])
Kapteyn, at seventy had a further life expectancy of seven years. It was also true
from relevant studies that academics who did not work in industry lived on
average ten years longer than the general population, and astronomers and
archaeologists another one and a half to two years [114, 115]. So he easily
269
Third, there was the opening speech of the first IAU president, EdouardBenjamin Baillaud (1848–1934) (see Fig. 12.10). In his in memoriam on
Kapteyn, Willem de Sitter wrote::
This modest workshop [the Astronomical Laboratory in Groningen] was the
starting point for the research, which completely changed the appearance of astronomical science. Recently, Arthur Eddington, on the occasion of the Royal
Astronomical Society’s centenary celebration, listed the six most important astronomical events of these hundred years, including: 1904, discovery of two Star
Streams by Kapteyn. And Baillaud, the veteran among astronomers, mentioned
in his opening speech as president of the Congress in Rome in May of this year,
the three things that revolutionized the face of science in the more than fifty years
that he had worked as an active astronomer, and these three were: photography,
the giant telescopes, and the Groningen Laboratory.
The latter is quite an exaggeration. Baillaud himself said (in my translation
from French) [113]:
A new revolution is underway: after the invention of reflective telescopes, spectroscopy and photography, we are now witnessing the arrival of gigantic instruments [...]. These instruments often remain unproductive if they are not
accompanied by all the necessary secondary devices found in an astronomical
laboratory. Since they are photographic plates that need to be studied, these laboratories do not have to be next to the telescopes. The laboratory in Groningen
provides excessive evidence of this.
12.7 The End
Kapteyn and his wife had intended to settle in Hilversum after his retirement.
In preparation for this and to inform themselves as to houses there, they first
temporarily moved in with their eldest daughter and son-in-law Noordenbos;
the latter was now a professor in Amsterdam. Indeed they found a suitable
home in Hilversum, but Kapteyn never lived there. His widow did live in that
house for many years and daughter Henriette moved to the same street after
she separated from Ejnar Hertzsprung in 1923.
Statistically speaking (for more details see my more extensive biography [5])
Kapteyn, at seventy had a further life expectancy of seven years. It was also true
from relevant studies that academics who did not work in industry lived on
average ten years longer than the general population, and astronomers and
archaeologists another one and a half to two years [114, 115]. So he easily