Solon I. Bailey

Solon I. Bailey, Phillips Professor of Astronomy at Harvard University, was born in 1854 in Lisbon, New Hampshire and attended Boston University. In 1887, he became an assistant at the Harvard College Observatory. The director, Edward C. Pickering, tasked him with making visual observations of stellar magnitudes with the meridian photometer.

In 1889, Pickering sent Bailey to Peru to investigate sites for a high-altitude, southern observing station where photographic plates could be made of the sky. He spent a year observing at "Mount Harvard" near Chosica and several months in the desert of Atacama. In 1890 Bailey recommended Arequipa at an elevation of 8,000 feet. The Boyden Station at Arequipa was formally established in 1891. Bailey served as its director from 1893 until 1905 with a brief interruption.

At Arequipa, Bailey photographed globular clusters with the 13-inch Boyden telescope and analyzed variable stars in them. Bailey was also a pioneer in establishing a chain of meteorological stations across Peru. He described the volcano, El Misti. In 1895, Arequipa was placed under seige by a rebel army, Bailey buried the valuable telescope lenses.

In 1896, the 24-inch Bruce telescope was erected at Arequipa, and Bailey would later use it to study extra-galactic nebulae. In 1899, he began a survey of southern stars with a magnitude of 7 or brighter with the meridian photometer. In 1900, the asteroid Eros was rediscovered at Arequipa. In 1903-1904, Bailey established light variations for Eros and for other asteroids.

In 1908-1909, Bailey was sent to check out possible sites for a Harvard observing station in South Africa.

On the death of Pickering in 1919, Bailey became acting director of the Observatory. He served until the appointment of Harlow Shapley in 1922.

In 1922 and 1923, Bailey returned to Arequipa to take charge of the Boyden Station, rehabilitate it, and to continue his studies of globular clusters, variable stars, nebulae, and the Milky Way with the Bruce telescope and other instruments.

Bailey retired in 1925 at the age of 70. He set to work on a history of the Harvard College Observatory, which was published in 1931. Bailey died that same year.