HISTORICAL NOTES

Comet Bappu–Bok–Newkirk – the only comet with an Indian’s name to it

R. C. Kapoor

This note celebrates the discovery of the Comet Bappu–Bok–Newkirk 1949 IV, the only one with an Indian’s name to it. Then a research student at Harvard, M. K. (1927–82) was destined to set modern in newly independent India on an ambitious path to progress.

What do we know about the Comet Bap- student whose 1950 thesis was on the factor of 2.512 such that the fainter the pu–Bok–Newkirk 1949 IV (1949c, formation and evolution of the Perseid object, the larger is its . The C/1949 N1), the only one with an meteor stream. The deliberations indicat- faintest the human eye sees on a Indian’s name to it? M. K. Vainu Bappu, ed that the comet had a parabolic clear dark night has magnitude +6. Bart J. Bok and Gordon A. Newkirk and retrograde motion for an inclination Though not so bright as to cheer up its made a serendipitous discovery of a 108 24 , a perihelion distance q = observers, the comet remained observa- comet in 1949 on a photographic plate of 1.36538 AU and that it would pass its ble for many months on. van a certain region of the sky taken with the perihelion on 22 November 1949 (1 AU, Biesbroeck2, at the Yerkes Observatory 24–33 inch Jewett–Schmidt telescope at the astronomical Unit, is the mean dis- and well known for his expertise in as- the Oak Ridge Station of the Harvard tance of the Earth from the Sun and is trophotography, predicted the brightness College Observatory (HCO) (Figure 1). 149,597,870.691 km). The comet was of the comet to improve from 12.6 mag. The plate, given a 55 min exposure, was noticed moving west, through the con- to 12.3 mag. between 31 July and 24 Au- taken in the early hours of 2 July 1949 stellation of Lyra in July and then gust 1949. Cunningham provided a short by Vainu Bappu under the direction of through Hercules in August. Through ephemeris of the comet for the second Bok, while he was a research student at September to December, it lay in the half of August4 that placed it at approxi- HCO. Announced as a ‘New Comet’ of Bootes. In November mately 1.7 AU from the Earth and about by Harlow Shapley1 in the Harvard Col- and December, the comet moved north. It 1.9 AU from the Sun, and predicted that lege Observatory Announcement Card passed by Thuban ( -Draconis), a the magnitude of the comet would be be- (HAC) 1006, the positions and descrip- 3.65 mag star in February 1950. Magni- tween 11 and 12. It did not brighten up. tion that were given corresponded to its tude, readers may recall, is a logarithmic As the comet was rather favourably posi- being situated in the constellation of measure of brightness of a celestial tioned with respect to the Earth, it was : object, where the next value differs by a followed for quite some time at many observatories such as the Yerkes and 1949 R.A. Dec. Mag. Lick, Hamburg and Engelhardt, at Al- July 2.30537 19h 47m.0 +38 36 13 giers, etc. and eventually lost5. Daily motion: 3m.6 west; 29 north Max Beyer observed the comet from Description 7 (no tail; diffuse; central the Hamburg Observatory in Bergedorf condensation). to make precise photometric estimates. A well-known amateur astronomer, Beyer Two Jewett plates taken by Bok and had devised an ingenious method to de- Vainu Bappu on the following night con- termine comet magnitudes. He reported firmed the discovery. The positions that the comet 1949 IV showing off a jet on were noted indicated that by then, the ob- 23 July and a coma 2 .0 in diameter. It ject had moved slightly westwards by touched mag. 11.8 on 24 July and 3 min in RA and north by 25 in Dec. reached its brightest at 11.2 mag. in Sep- The HACs, one may note, served back tember5. Merton6 cites Beyer describing then as a quicker means to disseminate that on 17 August the coma appeared information and announce discoveries. round, having grown to 2 .5 in diameter, On July 8, Shapley1 reported again the with a condensation and stellar nucleus positions the comet was at on 2 July, 4 at 13.9 mag. and a faint 5 long tail. By July and 5 July (HAC 1007), this time December 1949, the comet was reported under the heading ‘Comet Bappu–Bok– to be a morning object. It gradually

Newkirk’. In a week’s time since the dis- dimmed to about 13 mag. Reporting in covery, orbital elements and a prelimi- Figure 1. The three discoverers, Vainu the ‘Comet Notes’ of the Publications of nary ephemeris of the comet had been Bappu (left), Bok (seated) and Newkirk the Astronomical Society of the Pacific calculated by Hamid and Vainu Bappu, (right), also a Harvard student, inspect the (PASP) for the 1950, Cunningham7 1 comet plate (Photograph: Indian Institute Maxwell and Cunningham (HAC 1008), of Astrophysics (IIA) Archives). This pho- noted that the comet 1949c had gone 2 as also by van Biesbroeck ; see also Har- tograph had appeared in The Science fainter, yet within the reach of the 60- ris3. Hamid was then a Harvard graduate Newsletter, 1949, 56, 250–251. inch reflector at the Mount Wilson

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Observatory and so it would have been would have been when at a distance of ‘Ever discover a comet? Experience of the 19th mag. in brightness. In a sub- 1 AU from the Sun and the Earth isn’t always necessary. M. K. Vainu sequent note7, he indicated that the comet (r = = 1 AU) both5, the visual magni- Bappu, an Indian graduate student, had departed too far from its ephemeris tude at its distance in July 2013 can be proved that a few summers ago. Ob- in January for it to be easily observed. A computed. It turns out to be ~37 mag. serving for the first time at Agassiz new orbit was determined, with a period What telescope can ‘see’ it? An object at Station, Bappu exposed a plate for of about 60,000 , and the comet 37 mag. is far beyond the power of the sixty minutes in the small hours of could be recovered in March again. More existing facilities. Probably a 20-m space the morning of 2 July 1949. Plates recently, based on collected photometric telescope might ‘see’ it. That telescope such as these are ordinarily sent back observations of long-period comets and belongs to the future. According to an- to Cambridge for processing, but Pro- allowing for systematic differences other estimate of its absolute brightness8, fessor Bart Bok suggested that Bappu between individual observers and their the visual magnitude should be ~31 mag. develop it himself. When the plate methods of estimation, Svoren8 from the This value is close to ‘The HST eXtreme was developed, the graduate student Astronomical Observatory, Skalnaté Ple- Deep Field XDF… reaching… to 31.2 announced, “now I’m going to look so provided in 1985 precise photometric AB mag 5 (32.9 at 1 ) in a 0.35 dia- for a comet.” Bok, amused, chuckled. parameters like absolute brightness and meter aperture’ – the deepest image ever “Ha, ha, everyone looks for comets.” the photometric exponent at large helio- taken with the But upon inspection Bappu spotted centric distances for comets, including in the optical/near-IR10, what more plainly one, and Gordon A Newkirk and Bok those for Bappu–Bok–Newkirk. put is ~31 mag. confirmed his discovery. The comet, The comet has since turned out to be a of only the thirteenth magnitude, is periodic one. Certain parameters of the now known as the Bappu–Bok– comet Bappu–Bok–Newkirk are as ‘Ever discover a comet?’ Newkirk comet.’ follows9: aphelion Q = 3033.60 AU, per- ihelion q = 2.058177 AU, eccentricity The Harvard Crimson, the oldest daily This story was related by Bok himself to e = 0.998644, period (yrs) = a1.5 = college newspaper in the US since 24 the Associated Press that published it en- 59,134.75 yrs, where a is semi-major ax- January 1873, carried an anecdotal titled ‘Harvard Tyro Finds Comet’ (Fig- is = 1517.8296460 AU. account of the discovery of the comet ure 2), signed from Harvard, Mass. The particular spot where the comet Bappu–Bok–Newkirk in its issue dated Still a student back home, Vainu was discovered on 2 July 1949 is a few 28 April 1956. The relevant part of the Bappu had published papers on the spec- degrees SW of -Cygni (2.2 mag.) and paper retrieved from the archival issue trum of night airglow obtained with a lies close to the star 19 Cygni (5.12 mag.; does not attribute the write-up to any spectrograph when 16, and on variable J2000: 19h50m34s, 38 43 21 ). An incli- writer. It is entitled ‘It’s Easy’ and , and had even constructed a spec- nation angle of 105 .7686 suggests the makes for a joyful reading, as reproduced trograph. The first paper ‘The effect of comet arrived into the inner solar system here: colour on the visual observations of long nearly vertically, and its path is so ori- ented that it approached from below the ecliptic plane. Computing its orbit with Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s (JPL’s) Horizons system9, we find that at the time of discovery, the comet was leading the Sun, its solar elongation then being 116 .5802/L, the heliocentric distance r = 2.472157 AU and geocentric distance = 1.843890 AU. Beginning 11 July, the comet began to trail the Sun, leading it again from 18 November. It passed closest to the Earth on 16 July 1949 around 08:00 UT, from a distance of 1.79618838 AU and passed its perihelion on October 26.5491, 1949. In July 2013, 64 years after the dis- covery, the comet reached ~87 AU from the Earth, a distance well past Pluto’s orbit (mean distance from the Sun = 39.537 AU). From its orbit computa- tions, we find its present location to be at the border of the southern constellation Columba with Pictor and Puppis, and ~10 north of the bright star Canopus. As we have in hand an estimate of the Figure 2. The newspaper cutting about the comet’s discovery; paper and date not reduced magnitude of the comet, what it known (IIA Archives).

CURRENT SCIENCE, VOL. 105, NO. 1, 10 JULY 2013 117 HISTORICAL NOTES period variable stars’, dated 19 Novem- Embassy of India in Washington, DC as would have been a serious neglect of ber 1945, Nizam College, Hyderabad, follows (IIA Archives): his duty to the scientific world. appeared in the January 1946 issue of Our policy of education for gradu- Current Science as a letter. The next one, ‘My dear Bappu: ate students in Astronomy includes ‘On the visual light curve of RT. Erida- thorough background training in clas- ni’, dealt with an individual long-period The Hyderabad Government has ca- sical and positional astronomy, in variable star and appeared in the same bled to say that you should undertake stellar astronomy, in cosmogony and journal in July 1946. It was addressed research on ‘Photoelectric Photome- in modern astrophysics. We will not from Begumpet, 4 June 1946, where the try of Eclipsing Variables’. Please grant the degree of Doctor of Philos- author expressed in the end ‘his gratitude note this carefully and see that your ophy to a student who does not have to Dr Akbar Ali, Director, Nizamiah Ob- Government’s wishes are carried out a well-rounded background in all of servatory, for having kindly provided fa- in every respect. Should there be any these areas. If it is actually true that cilities and for his valuable guidance’. difficulty, however, the matter should that the Hyderabad Government Vainu Bappu had inspirational meetings be reported to us immediately, to- wishes Mr. Bappu to study “Photoe- with Harold Spencer Jones and Harlow gether with your Supervisor’s expert lectric Photometry of Eclipsing Vari- Shapley when they came to Hyderabad advice and comments. ables” and nothing else in his and went over to Harvard in 1949 after Yours sincerely, graduate work, they have certainly his Master’s in physics from the Madras Sd/. erred in sending him to Harvard Uni- University, on a scholarship from the A.S.G…...’ versity. We would be glad to assist Government of Hyderabad to pursue him in such a narrow study, if neces- work on photoelectric photometry of On behalf of Vainu Bappu’s ‘Supervi- sary, but we could not grant the de- eclipsing variable stars. The place had sor’, a reply from Whipple dated 26 July gree of Doctor of Philosophy in stalwarts like Shapley, Bok, Payne- 1949, and reproduced in full below, Astronomy on that basis alone. Gaposchkin, Donald Menzel and Fred sought to correct the view of the Hydera- Our experience has shown that in- Whipple (Figure 3). bad Government so: dependence of mind, a broad back- ground in mathematics and the ‘Dear Mr G…..,: physical sciences and freedom in The discovery fall-out choosing research problems are es- I am informed by Mr K. Vainu Bap- sential to a physical scientist who is Curiously, upon learning of the discov- pu that he has been reprimanded by to produce creative work. ery, Vainu Bappu was reprimanded by an the Hyderabad Government, presum- Mr. Bappu is doing excellent work over-zealous Government of Hyderabad ably for not holding strictly to his as a graduate student and has estab- for deviating from his main goal, i.e. re- undertaken research on “Photoelec- lished himself as an intelligent, able search. He received a letter dated 13 July tric Photometry of Eclipsing Varia- and well-liked personality. I feel per- 1949 from the Deputy Educational Liai- bles”. By implication, I gather that sonally that it is a great mistake for son Officer, Education Department of the the Hyderabad Government disap- him to be handicapped psychological- proves of Mr. Bappu’s participation ly by ill-founded reprimands that in the recent discovery of a comet. should be directed, if at all, to those This is the first occasion in my expe- who have assumed the responsibility rience in which a foreign govern- for his graduate education. ment has taken onto itself the Sincerely yours, criticism of our educational methods Fred L. Whipple, Chairman in the Astronomy Department of Department of Astronomy’. . I feel that if the Hyderabad Government chooses to Mr. G… sent back a reply dated 3 Au- criticize our methods, it should do so gust 1949, where words speak for them- by direct communication with us ra- selves, and as congratulatory as could be: ther than by reprimanding the stu- dent in such a way that he finds it ‘Dear Dr Whipple, difficult to follow our guidance in his advanced education. I thank you for your kind and detailed I may mention that the discovery of letter dated 26th July, 1949, concern- this comet was of an accidental na- ing Mr. V. Bappu. I am to inform you ture in conjunction with photographic that we have already written to Dr. work that is an essential part of Mr. on the subject, and Bappu’s training as a graduate stu- hope that it will clarify the point in dent in Astronomy. For him to have case there was any misunderstanding. Figure 3. Vainu Bappu with his profes- failed to note this unusual object on We are, however, very glad to hear sors at Harvard in 1950. (L–R) F. L. Whipple, M. K. Vainu Bappu, Harlow his photographic plates would have that Mr. Bappu has done satisfactory Shapley, Bart Bok and Donald Menzel (IIA been a sin of scientific omission; to work, so far, and we have no doubt, Archives). have failed to announce the discovery that with the able guidance and

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supervision of his professors, he will Bappu’s own words, ‘I learnt my astron- afternoon and examined by Bok and show still better results. We appreci- omy on the lap of my father’, as quoted Bappu for image quality and focus. In ate your willing co-operation with us in his obituary by Kochhar and Menon12. the process of their investigation and the personal interest you are tak- On 6 January 1986 the then Prime Minis- Gordon Newkirk, an undergraduate ing in Mr. Bappu’s welfare. ter Rajiv Gandhi visited the Kavalur Ob- student who happened to pass by, was Yours sincerely, servatory to watch the comet Halley. He called in to look at the good quality A. S. G…’. named the Observatory and the then of the images. After slightly adjusting newly installed and indigenously built the inspection frame he looked Vainu Bappu completed his Ph D and 2.34 m telescope after M. K. Vainu Bap- through the binocular microscope and joined the Mt Wilson and Palomar Ob- pu, the founder-director of the Indian In- suddenly exclaimed, “Hey, that looks servatories as a Fellow of the Carnegie stitute of Astrophysics. The telescope like the trail of an or some- Institution of Washington. He presented was Vainu Bappu’s brainchild that he thing!” Upon which Dr. Bok took a in 1952 an up-to-date picture on comets could not live to see in its place. While look and commented, “That is no as- through the immensely popular leaflets reminiscing in his Founder’s Day Lec- teroid – that is a hairy comet.” of the Astronomical Society of the Paci- ture during the Silver Jubilee Meeting of Without Newkirk’s detection of the fic (ASP)11. Here, he talked about the the Vainu Bappu Telescope during 10–12 trail the other two observers might recent major contributions to the under- August 2011, M. G. K. Menon said have missed the early discovery of standing of the nature and origin of Vainu Bappu was passionate about the comet. Without Bok’s correct comets by Whipple through his dirty comets. identification of the object it might snow-ball model and the comet cloud have been passed up as a casual as- model proposed by Jan H. Oort. teroid. Without Bappu’s interest in In the times to come, Vainu Bappu The Donohoe Comet-Medal taking the plate the object would cer- was destined to lay the foundations of tainly have remained undetected. In modern astronomy in India, build ob- In its report, the Donohoe Comet-Medal the opinion of the committee the only servatories and lead a researcher’s career Committee of the ASP described the dis- fair solution is a triple award.’ few can match, culminating in his elec- covery formally. The Committee was tion as President of the Astronomical So- considering comet discoveries for the The award numbers, extracted from a full ciety of India during 1973–1974, the years 1949 and 1950 during which six list by the Committee are given in Table 1. Vice-President of the International As- new comets had been reported. For tronomical Union during 1967–1973 and reasons of history, it is fair that the In his report, Merton6 had this to add – its President for the period 1979–1982, concerned long passage in the report 13 award of Padma Bhushan in 1981, etc. by Shane , Chairman of the Committee ‘The next day, just as they started to He was awarded the Donohoe Comet- (Cunningham and van Biesbroeck were examine the plate, Gordon A. Newkirk, Medal in 1949 by the Astronomical So- the other members) be just reproduced: Jr., an undergraduate who chanced to ciety of the Pacific (ASP) for the discov- pass by – it had been a hot day and he ery (Figure 4). Vainu Bappu’s father M. ‘The committee was faced with a per- was looking for his shirt! – was invit- K. Bappu was also an astronomer at the plexing case in regard to comet 1949c ed to note the excellent quality of the Nizamiah Observatory, who observed which was announced as discovered plate and, on inspecting it, noticed variable stars and had participated in the by three observers at the Harvard Ob- the trail of the comet.’ Carte du Ciel programme and in Vainu servatory. The circumstances of the discovery have been described by B. Merton6 lists out the orbital elements of J. Bok and partly published in Mer- the comets of 1949 also, wherein the ton’s “Report on Progress of Astron- Bappu–Bok–Newkirk comet has a para- omy” (M.N. 110, 175, 1950). The bolic orbit. plate on which the comet was found Incidentally, Shane’s report mentions was the first long exposure obtained also of Akbar Ali’s communication from by Vainu Bappu with the Jewett– the Nizamiah Observatory about an ob- Schmidt telescope at the Oak Ridge ject: ‘A purported cometary object re- Station in the early morning of 2 July ported by A. Ali, Hyderabad Observatory 1949. It was developed the following (India) on November 27, 1950, was sub-

Table 1. The award numbers, extracted from a full list by the Committee

Award Designation Discoverer Date

242 1949c Vainu Bappu, Harvard College July 2, 1949 Observatory, Oak Ridge Station, Mass. 243 1949c Bart J. Bok, Harvard College July 2, 1949 Observatory, Oak Ridge Station, Mass. 244 1949c Gordon Newkirk, Harvard College July 2, 1949 Figure 4. M. K. V. Bappu’s Donohoe Observatory, Oak Ridge Station, Mass. Gold Medal (IIA Archives).

CURRENT SCIENCE, VOL. 105, NO. 1, 10 JULY 2013 119 HISTORICAL NOTES sequently retracted by him’. Akbar Ali’s It was broken and has a single crack, What made Bok and Vainu Bappu annual reports for 1950 and 1951 did not and has been repaired. There are no ink choose to photograph that night the star carry reference to such an observation. markings on the glass to indicate the field around 19 Cygni? The constellation comet. Luckily, I searched for later plates of Cygnus spreads right over the rich and see it marked, though it is very faint. column of the , but 19 Cygni, The discovery plate The Jewett–Schmidt had a 24 –33 aper- a 5th mag. red giant star, lies in a less ture with a plate scale of 98 arcsec/mm’. spectacular region. With the Sun still The original discovery plate of the Com- ~22 below horizon and Cygnus passing et Bappu–Bok–Newkirk lies in the vast That makes the plate field to be ~5.5 . the meridian, the early hours of 2 July Harvard College Observatory Astronom- We can easily identify 19 Cygni 1949 at the Oak Ridge turned out to be ical Plate Stacks that have been main- (5.12 mag), the brightest star in the im- for Vainu Bappu an opener of the grand tained all along with great care (Figure age (Figure 5). We first looked into the innings ahead. 5). These are being digitized under an image for the comet near the position David Levy, the discoverer and co- ongoing project called ‘DASCH: Digital corresponding to that given in HAC discoverer of 22 comets and 41 , Access to a Sky Century at Harvard’. Al- 1006. That point is about half a degree and best known for the co-discovery in ison Doane, Curator of Astronomical west of 19 Cygni. The ephemeris of the 1993 of the comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 Photographs, HCO sifted out the discov- comet computed with JPL’s Horizons (D/1993 F2), provides a delightful re- ery plate recently, in May 2013. It is re- system for the night of 2 July 1949 also rendering of one of T. S. Eliot’s poems, produced here, along with its jacket, places it near 19 Cygni, and a little west ‘The naming of Cats’ from his ‘Old Pos- courtesy HCO. As Doane described in her of the star HD187638 (6.11 mag). How- sum’s Book of Practical Cats’ published e-mails to this author: ‘I looked through ever, in the plate, the comet turns out to in 1939. Levy replaces the word cat by our compilation of plate series (we have be about a degree east of 22 Cygni and comet to convey that the ‘idea is analo- many series) and saw the “Jewett– one-fourth of a degree east of the star gous to the naming of comets’. The lines Schmidt,” The plate that says “Discovery HD189235 (6.676 mag). It is a faint trail, relevant here are reproduced below14: Plate Comet Bappu–Bok–Newkirk 1949c” but noticeable. The jacket of the plate also lists “Bok and VB” as the observers. carries coordinates that rightly corre- ‘The naming of comets is a difficult mat- This plate is J3064, a blue-sensitive plate spond to the comet’s apparent position, ter, 8 8 in size. RA: 19h59, Dec: +39.0; not to some particular (Figure 6). It isn’t just one of your holiday games; Date: July 1–2, 1949 Exposure 55 minutes.

Figure 5. Discovery plate (J3064) of the Comet Bappu–Bok–Newkirk. The bright- est star in the image is 19 Cygni and the comet is located along the tiny star pair, lower-left of it and a little above the bot- tom of the image, above where the hand- written ‘1’ appears; the words were written in the dark; plate scale 98 arcsec/mm and north-south are along the diagonal. Ro- tate the plate about the horizontal line, the writing ‘39000 103aO J3064’ can be read; ‘103aO’ denotes the emulsion used. The comet is just a tiny fuzzy form and we cannot help it, but appreciate the eyes of its discoverers. The Julian date for the plate J3064: 2433099.808, calculated for the middle of the exposure, heliocentric- corrected (Image courtesy: Harvard Col- lege Observatory (HCO)). Figure 6. Jacket of the comet discovery plate J3064 (Image courtesy: HCO).

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You may think at first I’m mad as a hatter Or spread out emissions, or cherish his 11. Bappu, M. K. V., Astron. Soc. Pac. Leaf- When I tell you, a comet has THREE pride?...’ lets, 1952, 229–235. DIFFERENT NAMES. 12. Kochhar, R. K. and Menon, M. G. K., Bull. Astron. Soc. India, 1982, 10, 275– First of all, there’s the name that the 279. family use daily. 1. Shapley, H., Harvard College Observa- 13. Shane, C. D., Cunningham, L. E. and van Such as Whipple, Wilk–Peltier, Wirtanen tory Announcement Cards, 5 July 1949, Biesbroeck, G., Publ. Astron. Soc. Pac., 1006; 8 July, 1007; 11 July, 1008. or Wolf, 1952, 64, 39–40. 2. van Biesbroeck, G., Pop. Astron., 1949, Such as Hubble or Humason, Honda, 14. Levy, D. H., Natl. Newsl. R. Astron. Soc. 57, 350–351. P/Halley- Can. (Suppl.), 1986, 80, L92–L93. All of them sensible everyday names. 3. Harris, D. L., Pop. Astron., 1949, 57, 410. There are fancier names if you think they ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS. I thank the Di- 4. Jeffers, H. M., Publ. Astron. Soc. Pac., rector, Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA), sound sweeter. 1949, 61, 195; 267–268. Bangalore for permission to use material from Some for the gentlemen, some for the 5. Vsekhosvyatskii, S. K., In Physical the IIA Archives. I am grateful to Drs Christi- dames: Characteristics of Comets, Israel Pro- na Birdie, A. Vagiswari and the Library IIA Such as Grigg–Skjellerup, de Kock– gram for Scientific Translations, Jerusa- for help with accessing various references. Paraskevopoulos, lem, 1964, pp. 539–540. I thank Prof. Tushar Prabhu for discussions. I Schwassmann–Wachmann, Herschel– 6. Merton, G., MNRAS, 1950, 110, 175– am grateful to the Harvard College Observa- Rigollet, Tsuchinshan I, 178. tory for making available the images of the Churyumov–Solodovnikov, Bappu–Bok– 7. Cunningham, L. E., Publ. Astron. Soc. Comet Bappu–Bok–Newkirk including the Newkirk– Pac., 1951, 63, 42; 153–154. discovery plate for reproduction here. E-mail 8. Svoren, J., Contrib. Astron. Obs. Skalna- But all of them sensible everyday names. exchanges with Dr Alison Doane, Curator of té Pleso, 1985, 13, 165–216. Astronomical Photographs, HCO were very But I tell you, a comet needs a name 9. Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Small-body helpful. that’s particular, database browser; http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/ A name that’s peculiar, and more digni- sbdb.cgi

fied. 10. Illingworth, G. D. et al., arXiv:1305. R. C. Kapoor lives at # 31, 4th ‘B’ Block, Else, how can he keep up his tail anti- 1931 [astro-ph.CO]; submitted on 8 May Koramangala, Bangalore 560 034, India. solar, 2013. e-mail: [email protected]

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