Background

Safford was born in Royalton, Vermont, on 6 January 1836. He was eldest of eight children of Truman Hopson and Louisa (Parker) Safford.

He was descended from Thomas Safford who became a freeman of the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1630; his great-grandfather, John Safford, born at Preston, Connecticut, in 1729, was among the original grantees of Royalton (1781); his grandfather, Nathan, is said to have carried the town's assessment list in his head. Both parents were well qualified to direct his development. His father, a farmer, took a lively interest in public affairs while his mother before marriage had been a teacher.

Education

Delicate health prevented his regular attendance at school, but his father's library offered opportunities to his liking. At two years he knew his letters and at six he showed extraordinary skill and speed in lengthy mental and written computations. Stimulated by a visit to Dartmouth College, he computed an almanac for 1846 for Bradford, Vt. , and for 1847 he computed almanacs for Bradford, Cincinnati, Philadelphia, and Boston.

After fitting for college he graduated from Harvard with honor in 1854

Career

In 1847 President Everett and Professor Benjamin Peirce of Harvard became interested in him, and the family moved to Cambridge, Massachussets. For twelve years thereafter he was a member of the staff of Harvard Observatory and after the death of Professor George P. Bond was acting director for about a year. Volumes IV and V of the Annals were completed and published under his supervision.

In 1866 he became professor of astronomy at the old University of Chicago and director of the Dearborn Observatory, but the Chicago fire of 1871 put an end to public support of this observatory and for the five years following he was occupied with astronomical work connected with United States geographical surveys. He took part at various times in teaching physics and mathematics and also acted as librarian.

With the Repsold circle of the Field Memorial Observatory, established in 1882, he made the observations for The Williams College Catalogue of North Polar Stars (1888).

He suffered a paralytic stroke some years before his death, which occurred at the home of a son in Newark, N. J.

Achievements

• He became Field Memorial Professor of Astronomy at Williams College, and this position he held until his death. His astronomical interests lay mainly in the fields of the older astronomy and his many papers on orbits, ephemerides, positions of stars, proper motions, methods of reduction, instrumental and personal corrections to observations, the proper motion of Sirius before and after discovery of its companion, etc. , appeared in the Astronomical Journal, the Sidereal Messenger, the Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and other scientific journals of the United States, England, and Germany. He also published Mathematical Teaching and Its Modern Methods (1887), The Development of Astronomy in the United States (1888), others. The Safford Fund for Williams College student researchers was created by his descendants to honor him. A portrait of him as a child prodigy hangs in the Hopkins Observatory's Mehlin Museum of Astronomy, adjacent to the Milham Planetarium.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Mathematical Teaching And It's Modern Methods

    (Mathematical Teaching And It's Modern Methods is an uncha...)

  • Catalogue of 621 Stars - Primary Source Edition

    (This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)

  • A discourse read June 25, 1888 to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the dedication of the Hopkins Observatory of Williams College - Primary Source Edition

    (This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)

  • The Williams College Catalogue of North Polar Stars Right Ascension for 18850

Personality

His natural calculating abilities seemed to wane with age.

Connections

He married at Cambridge, Massachussets, Mar. 8, 1860, Elizabeth Marshall Bradbury, and to them were born six children. Five of these, with their mother, survived him.

Father:

Truman Hopson Safford

Mother:

Louisa (Parker) Safford

Spouse:

Elizabeth Marshall Bradbury

Great-grandfather:

John Safford

Grandfather:

Nathan Safford

coworker:

George P. Bond