Women Who Read the Stars Sue Nelson Delights in Dava Sobel’S Account of a Rare Band of Human Computers

Home , Annie Jump Cannon, Elena Cattaneo, Harvard Computers, Henry Draper

Some of the Harvard Observatory ‘computers’ in 1925. Annie Jump Cannon is seated fifth from left; Cecilia Payne is at the drafting table.

HISTORY Women who read the stars Sue Nelson delights in Dava Sobel’s account of a rare band of human computers.

here are half a million photographic magnitude, on the as computers at Harvard, a practice unique plates in the Harvard College Observa- photographic plates to the university. Within five years, the num- tory collection, all unique. They date to and computing its ber of paid female computers, from a range Tthe mid-1880s, and each can display the light location in the sky. of backgrounds, had risen to 14. Their efforts from 50,000 stars. These fragments of the Pickering was espe- would be boosted by philanthropist Cath- cosmos furthered our understanding of the cially interested in erine Wolfe Bruce, who in 1889 donated Universe. They also reflect the dedication and variable stars, whose US$50,000 to the observatory, convinced intelligence of extraordinary women whose light would brighten that the introduction of photography and

stories are more than astronomical history: and fade over a spe- spectroscopy would advance the field. ARCHIVES UNIV. HARVARD COURTESY they reveal lives of ambition, aspiration and cific period. These The Glass The Glass Universe concentrates on a few of brilliance. It takes a talented writer to inter- fluctuations, captured Universe: How the Harvard computers. Williamina Fleming, weave professional achievement with per- on the plates, required the Ladies of a Scottish school teacher, arrived at the obser- sonal insight. By the time I finished The Glass constant observation, the Harvard vatory in 1879, pregnant and abandoned by Universe, Dava Sobel’s wonderful, meticulous but he couldn’t afford Observatory Took her husband. Pickering employed her as a the Measure of the account, it had moved me to tears. extra staff. Stars maid and housekeeper before promoting In the nineteenth century, US women Some years later, DAVA SOBEL her to computer in 1881. Fleming discovered had no vote (that would come in 1920). The opportunity arrived in Viking: 2016 more than 300 variable stars and, in 1899, careers open to the vast majority were in the form of the wealthy became Harvard’s first curator of astronomi- domestic service, farms, factories, schools Anna Palmer Draper, widow of amateur cal photographs. She and Pickering revised or offices. Fortunately, Maria Mitchell, the astronomer and physician Henry Draper. the classification of stars using their spectral first woman in the United States to discover She set up a memorial to fund his great ambi- lines, labelling them alphabetically from the a comet, left a guiding light. In 1865, she tion: to photograph the night sky and create bluest, hottest stars to the coolest red stars. became the first professor of astronomy at a spectral catalogue of the stars. When star- Henrietta Swan Leavitt, who studied Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York, a light is split by a prism or spectroscope at the at another women’s institution, Radcliffe new institute of higher education for women. end of a telescope, it can produce a tiny grey College in Cambridge, began as a volunteer Yet change was slow. When Edward Picker- smudge, millimetres long, on a photographic in 1895, gaining a permanent post in 1903. ing became director of the Harvard Observa- plate. The separated light, on closer examina- Five years later, she determined the relation- tory in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1877, tion, reveals vertical black spectral lines. This ship between luminosity and period of fluc- being a ‘computer’ was still predominantly stellar barcode provides a star’s chemical com- tuation for a class of pulsing variable stars a man’s job. This low-paid but essential position, colour and temperature. called Cepheids. That enabled astronomers to work involved noting a star’s brightness, or By 1883, six women were already working calculate a star’s distance from Earth, and

COMMENT BOOKS & ARTS

in 1918 allowed Harlow Shapley, who POLITICS would become Pickering’s successor, to extend the boundaries of the Milky Way. Leavitt’s work also laid the foundation for Life at the divide Edwin Hubble’s finding, in 1925, that our Galaxy was not a lone ‘island Universe’ but one of billions. In 1929, Hubble used Leav- Alison Abbott hails a memoir from Italian senator and itt’s work and spectral shifts to show that biologist Elena Cattaneo, scourge of pseudoscience. this populous Universe is also expanding. Annie Jump Cannon arrived in 1896, following studies in mathematics, physics ne hot day in August 2013, the Ogni giorno: Tra cells progressively die. and astronomy at another women’s col- phone rang in the laboratory of scienza e politica Stem-cell research has lege, Wellesley, in the Massachusetts town neuroscientist Elena Cattaneo at the (Every Day: provided new insights of the same name. She refined and simpli- OUniversity of Milan. The then-president of Between Science into the disease, which fied the Pickering–Fleming system of stel- Italy, Giorgio Napolitano, wished to speak and Politics) is why she had fought ELENA CATTANEO lar classification by proving that most stars to her in Rome as soon as possible. Mondadori: 2016. so hard for the right were of a similar type. The International Cattaneo was already a minor national to do it responsibly. Astronomical Union adopted her system figure, known for her opposition to all Those battles stole precious time and energy. in 1922, three years after Pickering’s death. forms of pseudoscience, however powerful Would being a senator for life — with the Cecilia Payne, educated at the Uni- the perpetrators. In one of her first public inevitable widening of her repertoire of fights versity of Cambridge, UK, came to the fights, in 2009, she criticized the Vatican for — drain too much from her scientific life? observatory on a fellowship in 1923, condemning the use of human embryonic Ogni giorno is a fascinating account of how under Shapley. As part of her PhD, she stem cells in research. At the time of the call, a scientist entered the messy business of poli- determined correctly that stars were pre- she was in the middle of a battle to stop the tics (arguably more so in Italy than in other dominantly composed of hydrogen and government supporting a clinical trial of rich countries) and learnt to survive. Cattaneo helium. In 1956, she became Harvard’s an unproven stem-cell ‘therapy’ run by the accepted the position. As one of only a few first female professor of astronomy. maverick Stamina Foundation in Brescia. appointed by the president, the role signifies Payne provides some of the book’s most The call made her wonder whether she had a person’s importance to national culture. touching passages. Sobel describes, for overstepped some mark. But she set boundaries. She would not give instance, Payne’s distress at the untimely Napolitano had something quite differ- up her lab, and in the Senate she would engage death of her friend and fellow computer ent to discuss at his residence in Rome, the mainly with themes relating to science. She Adelaide Ames in 1932, and her whirl- baroque Quirinal Palace. He told Cattaneo, would apply the same rigour to evidence wind romance with the astronomer and then aged just 51, that he wanted her to supporting a political hypothesis as she Russian émigré Sergei Gaposchkin, whom become a senator for life: what did she think? would to that supporting a scientific one. She she married in 1934. Later that year, Payne “It was as if my every atom had been would not vote if such evidence were miss- won the inaugural Annie Jump Cannon paralysed by the question,” she recalls in her ing, and she would vote only according to her Prize for contributions to astronomy, book Ogni giorno: Tra scienza e politica (Every conscience, never along any party lines. receiving $50 and a gold pin, designed by Day: Between Science and Politics). “Seconds In August that year, she was sworn in along Cannon, in the form of a spiral nebula. passed without me being able to line up a with conductor Claudio Abbado (who died These personal touches flesh out the meaningful sentence. The President realised, five months later), architect Renzo Piano and women’s lives. We are shown Payne, for and touching my arm as if to shake me, he Nobel-prizewinning physicist Carlo Rubbia. instance, pawning her violin and jewel- jokingly said: ‘Professor, can I get you a cor- She threw herself into action, appointing a lery to fund her research, and combining dial?’” small team to help with research and admin- motherhood with astronomy. The low Cattaneo works on Huntington’s disease, istration, and organized a series of workshops wages were a sticking point with many an incurable genetic disorder in which brain with invited scientists from around the world. of them — Fleming often mentions it The aim was to educate parliamentarians in in her diaries. Yet, as Sobel shows, they themes such as science, health and innova- clearly liked and admired Pickering and tion, neuroscience and cell therapy. Shapley, who encouraged their work and She quickly learnt about Senate investiga- facilitated their professional progress. tions and organized one into the Stamina One of the last computers in the debacle, a process that took more than a twentieth century, Radcliffe alumna year. Published in February 2015, the report Ellen Dorrit Hoffleit, gets a brief mention assigns responsibility for every step in the towards the end. She joined the observa- affair that allowed public hospitals to host tory in 1928. In 2004, I met her at Yale the treatment, the government to support University in New Haven, Connecticut, it and numerous courts to rule that patients when I was making a radio documentary had the right to it — even though it had SCATTOLON/CONTRASTO/EYEVINE ANTONIO for the BBC on the Harvard computers. been condemned as dangerous by the Italian An energetic 96, Hoffleit was working health authorities. on a paper about meteors. Like all of Her repertoire of battles, as anticipated, did this band of remarkable women, she was expand and she found herself on steep learn- unforgettable, as is this book. ■ ing curves. One of these was genetically mod- ified (GM) crops. In 2015, Italy’s parliament Sue Nelson is an award-winning science debated the sensitive issue of whether each journalist and broadcaster. European Union member state should have e-mail: [email protected] Elena Cattaneo. the right to ban cultivation in their territories