In the early 1900s, a determined professor of astronomy undertook the ambitious quest to build a new observatory abroad when U-M’s own observatory in Ann Arbor was threatened by a coal power plant. The result was an observatory in South Africa with U-M ties and a fascinating legacy.
Detroit Observatory
Trains crashing. People dying. Businesses struggling. The perils of keeping incorrect time in Detroit were significant, and the city desperately needed a solution. A visionary academic, a knowledge-loving businessman, and new technology to plot the stars would converge on a small hill at U-M, changing Detroit—and the campus—forever.
Detroit Observatory
What is the universe? How big is it? What is our place in it? Astronomers have been trying to answer these questions for centuries, from Aristotle to Ptolemy to Copernicus. And as our astronomical knowledge expands, questions like these continue to surface.
astronomy
In the summer of 1878, U-M Professor James Watson headed west to observe a solar eclipse, confident he would find a new planet called Vulcan. Instead, he discovered the limitations of science in the late-1800s and the fine line separating fascination and folly.
astronomy