Reference no: EM132975912

Harvard's Secret "Computers"

In 1881, the astronomer Edward Pickering, who worked at the Harvard College Observatory, had the ambitious idea of mapping the skies. After firing a male staffer who was not doing a sufficiently good job cataloging stars, Mr. Pickering decided to hire women to work in the observatory basement to help him reach his goal (American Museum of Natural History, 2015; Pandika, 2014). Because cataloging stars in the night sky was considered a tedious and secretarial task, Mr. Pickering employed several women to complete the task, among whom was his maid, Williamina Fleming (American Museum of Natural History, 2015; Geiling, 2013; Pandika, 2014). This group of at least 80 women astronomers took images of the night sky and printed them onto glass plates. The women then made written copies from the glass plates into their notebooks. Some of the women classified stars, while others cataloged pictures, writing the date and location on the plates. Their salary was 25-50 cents per hour. Men's salaries were twice that amount (American Museum of Natural History, 2015; Geiling, 2013; Pandika, 2014).

"The women were not allowed to use the observatory telescopes, but that did not prevent them from making important discoveries" (Pandika, 2014). Antonia Maury, one of the workers, made a significant discovery. "She identified the second binary star shortly after Pickering discovered the first. She was also the first to calculate the path of these stars' orbits and the time needed to complete them" (Pandika, 2014). However, Maury was never recognized for her contribution. Similarly, Annie Jump Cannon's and Henrietta Leavitt's hard work, dedication, and findings were not acknowledged. Cannon cataloged 350,000 stars and simplified Maury's system. In fact, Cannon "classified hundreds of thousands of stars" and developed a star classification system which is still used today (American Museum of Natural History, 2015). She was the first woman to serve as an officer in the American Astronomical Society as well as to earn an honorary degree from Oxford (American Museum of Natural History, 2015). However, this system was not named after Cannon. Instead, it is called the Harvard system of spectral classification (Geiling, 2013; Pandika, 2014).

Two years before Ms. Cannon retired in 1940, Harvard acknowledged her work by naming her the William C. Bond Astronomer. Mr. Pickering had a 42-year career at Harvard Observatory, during which he received many awards "including the Bruce Medal, the Astronomical Society of the Pacific's highest honor. Craters on the moon and on Mars are named after him" (Geiling, 2013). To place this case in its historical context, Harvard University was established in 1636 and was dedicated to educating an all-male student body. Radcliffe was established as a "Harvard Annex" for women and opened its doors in 1879 with an all-male faculty to educate the all-female student body. Harvard and Radcliffe merged their admissions in 1975, and it was in 1977 that Harvard's ratio of accepting four men for every one woman accepted ended and was replaced by sex-blind admissions. In 1999, Radcliffe officially merged with Harvard (Walsh, 2012).

After reading the case, what are your thoughts regarding:

Women worked as hard as men in the basement of the Harvard College Observatory. They had to classify stars, catalog pictures, and transcribe information into tables. Why were their salaries so meager? Why do you believe we never heard of these women?