Alvan Clark
{{Short description|American astronomer and telescope maker}}
{{Infobox scientist
| name = Alvan Clark
| image =1891 AlvanClark Boston.png
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| birth_date = {{Birth date|1804|3|8|mf=y}}
| birth_place = Ashfield, Massachusetts
| death_date = {{death date and age|1887|8|19|1804|3|8|mf=y}}
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| citizenship =
| nationality = American
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| field = Astronomy
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| prizes = Lalande Prize (1862)
Rumford Prize (1866)
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}}
Alvan Clark (March 8, 1804 – August 19, 1887) was an American astronomer and telescope maker.
Biography
Born in Ashfield, Massachusetts, Clark started as a portrait painter and engraver (c.1830s–1850s), and at the age of 40 became involved in telescope making. Using glass blanks made by Chance Brothers of Birmingham, England, and Feil-Mantois of Paris, France, his firm Alvan Clark & Sons ground lenses for refracting telescopes. Their lenses included the largest in the world at the time: the {{convert|18.5|in|cm|sing=on}} at Dearborn Observatory at the Old University of Chicago (the lens originally intended for Ole Miss); also the two {{convert|26|in|cm|sing=on}} telescopes at the United States Naval Observatory and McCormick Observatory, the {{convert|30|in|cm|sing=on}} at Pulkovo Observatory, which was destroyed in the Siege of Leningrad (only the lens survives), the {{convert|36|in|cm|sing=on}} telescope at Lick Observatory (still the third-largest), and later the {{convert|40|in|cm|sing=on}} at Yerkes Observatory, which remains the largest successful refracting telescope in the world.
Although not specifically searching for double stars, he did make a number of discoveries while testing his completed telescope objectives,{{cite book | title=An Anthology of Visual Double Stars | first1=Bob | last1=Argyle | first2=Mike | last2=Swan | first3=Andrew | last3=James | page=288 | isbn=9781108601702 | publisher=Cambridge University Press | date=2019 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jSmqDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT288 }} including Mu Herculis, 8 Sextantis, and 95 Ceti.{{cite journal | title=New Double Stars, with remarks | last1=Clark | first1=A. | last2=Dawes | first2=W. R. | journal=Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society | volume=17 | page=257 | date=June 1857 | doi=10.1093/mnras/17.9.257 | bibcode=1857MNRAS..17..257C | doi-access=free }} One of Clark's sons, Alvan Graham Clark, discovered the dim companion of Sirius. Two craters bear Clark Sr.'s name. The crater Clark on the Moon is jointly named for him and his son, Alvan Graham Clark, and one on Mars is named in his honour.{{cite journal | title=The new Martian nomenclature of the International Astronomical Union | display-authors=1 | last1=de Vaucouleurs | first1=G. | last2=Blunck | first2=J. | last3=Davies | first3=M. | last4=Dollfus | first4=A. | last5=Koval | first5=I. K. | last6=Kuiper | first6=G. P. | last7=Masursky | first7=H. | last8=Miyamoto | first8=S. | last9=Moroz | first9=V. I. | last10=Sagan | first10=Carl | last11=Smith | first11=Bradford | journal=Icarus | volume=26 | issue=1 | date=September 1975 | pages=85−98 | doi=10.1016/0019-1035(75)90146-3 | bibcode=1975Icar...26...85D }} His other son was George Bassett Clark; both sons were partners in the firm.
Clark was also competitive in target shooting and received a patent for his device to allow bullets to be seated into a muzzle-loading rifle without damage to either the bullet or the rifle's muzzle. Exclusive license to this patent (1,565 of April 24, 1840) was made to Edwin Wesson, brother of Daniel B. Wesson.{{ cite journal | last = Hamilton | first = John D. | journal = American Society of Arms Collectors Bulletin | title = Alvan Clark and the False Muzzle | issue = 79 | pages = 31–37 }}
In 1880, Clark was elected as a member to the American Philosophical Society.{{Cite web|title=APS Members History|url=https://search.amphilsoc.org/memhist/search?year=1880];smode=advanced;startDoc=1|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210514152905/https://search.amphilsoc.org/memhist/search?year=1880%5D;smode=advanced;startDoc=1 |archive-date=May 14, 2021 }}
See also
Image gallery
;Portraits by Clark
Image:FemalePortrait ca1835 byAlvanClark MetropolitanMuseumOfArt.png|Portrait of an unidentified woman, c. 1835 (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City)
Image:JohnPickering ca1840 byAlvanClark MFA Boston.png|Portrait of John Pickering, c. 1840 (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)
Image:SamuelHallGregory ca1840s byAlvanClark Smithsonian.png|Portrait of Samuel Hall Gregory, c. 1840s (Smithsonian, Washington D.C.)
Image:1846 JosephStory byAlvanClark MFABoston.png|Portrait of Joseph Story, 1846 (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)
References
{{reflist}}
- {{cite encyclopedia | url = http://reference.allrefer.com/encyclopedia/C/Clark-Al.html | title = Alvan Clark, Astronomy, Biographies | encyclopedia = AllRefer.com | url-status = dead | archiveurl = https://web.archive.org/web/20040623152608/http://reference.allrefer.com/encyclopedia/C/Clark-Al.html | archive-date = June 23, 2004 }}
- {{cite book | title = Alvan Clark & Sons, Artists in Optics | author = Deborah Jean Warner | author2 = Robert B. Ariail | year = 1995 | name-list-style = amp | isbn = 0-943396-46-8 }}
Further reading
- "Recent Deaths. Alvan Clark." Boston Daily Evening Transcript, 19 August 1887.
- "Autobiography of Alvan Clark." New-England Historical and Genealogical Register 43 (January 1889): 52-58.
- {{Cite DAB|title=Clark, Alvan|author=Raymond S. Dugan|year=1930}}
- Warner, Deborah Jean. Alvan Clark & Sons, Artists in Optics. Washington, 1968.
External links
{{commons category|Alvan Clark}}
- [https://www.nga.gov/collection-search-result.html?artist=Clark%2C%20Alvan National Gallery of Art] has works by Clark
- {{Cite NSRW|wstitle=Clark, Alvan|short=x}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Clark, Alvan}}
Category:Telescope manufacturers
Category:Burials at Mount Auburn Cemetery
Category:People from Ashfield, Massachusetts