CECILIA PAYNE Roberto Bartali

Cecilia Helena Payne, was born in Wendover England on May 10, 1900 and died in 1979. She was one of the best and most productive astronomers in the XX century. Her interest in Astronomy (4) begin in 1919 when she attended a conference held by Eddington about the Solar Eclipse expedition to Brazil. But another version states that her interest in astronomy begin when she was 5 years old when she saw a meteorite. In a letter written near the end of her life we can read: “I was seized with panic at the thought that everything might be found out before I was old enough to begin”. She moved from England to USA searching for a better job opportunity and seeking for more suitable instruments to continue her investigations, because there was no much field of action in England, and Europe, in general at that time.

Portait of Cecilia Payne. From: http://www.physics.ucla.edu/~cwp/Phase2/Payne-Gaposchkin,_Cecilia_Helena@861234567.html

Before World War II (WW2), there was a very little opportunity for a woman to work, to study, to create a company and to join politics, normally the women work was to keep her house and the care of the children.

This vision, changed dramatically during and after the WW2 because an enormous number of men died, so, in all fields, from school teaching to science, economy and politics, women started to play a fundamental role. But, centuries of some kind of “segregation” may not be erased in a few decades, so this is the reason because, even today, in some fields, a woman is not very well welcome.

When the role of a woman was considered something less than the role of a man, there is no surprise to see the reaction of those eminencies like Russel and Shapley. What a scandal! A young, undergraduate or newly graduated woman that better understand stellar physics than some older and well recognized astronomers of the time!

Ceilia Payne observing through the blinking microscope. From: http://cannon.sfsu.edu/~gmarcy/cswa/history/cecilia.html

Even swimming against the current, he received the first PhD in astronomy in

1925 ever conferred at Harvard College Observatory. Otto Struve, said some 30 years later, that Cecilia Thesis was the best ever written in astrophysics.

The role of Shapley was fundamental for the Cecilia career and for the future development of stellar astrophysics (1), he offered her a Pickering Fellowship for a female student. But, also, Shapley, in an absolutely disregard of her thesis work, and

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instead to let her continue the research on role of the temperature and the ionization state of the atoms in the star atmosphere affect the strength of the spectral lines, placed

Cecilia to continue the work of Henrietta Leavitt on the establishment of a standard scale for stars magnitudes and colours. From 1925 to 1930, Cecilia Payne served just as a technical assistant to Shapley earning a little salary despite of her work and discoveries. Henry Norris Russell was another person who influenced the Cecilia work. He rejected her discovery and put some shadow on her work, until he changed his opinion and published a paper in the Astrophysical Journal in 1929, giving only the credit to Cecilia of reaching the same results, as him, but in different way. From a letter to Cecilia Payne sent by Russell in 1925 we can read (2):

Cecilia Payne photographed in 1923, on board the ship sailing to America. From: http://www.acad.carleton.edu/curricular/PHYS/Astro/pages/marga_michele/Cecilia_Payne.html

“…There remains one very much more serious discrepancy, namely, that for hydrogen, helium and oxygen. Here I am convinced that there is

something seriously wrong with the present theory. It is clearly impossible that hydrogen should be a million times more

abundant than the metals, and I have no doubt that the number of hydrogen atoms in the two quantum state is enormously greater than is indicated by the theory of Fowler and Milne….”. For his paper of 1929, Russel was inspired by the work of his student Donald Menzel.

Even Eddington, who she admired, do not accepted her PhD conclusion about the chemical composition of the stars (mostly hydrogen, some helium and a few metals) fully proved years later, and, maybe due to a moment of uncertainty or shyness in front of such important people like him, shapely and Russel. All the work done at Harvard was unofficial and unacknowledged until 1938 (3). That year the Harvard College give

her the title of Astronomer, title she wished to change as Phillips Astronomer, but without success. From 1938 to 1945, none of the courses she

Cecilia Payne in her office, with Sergei Gaposchkin and her children Katherine and Edward. From: http://www.astrogea.org/surveys/Cecilia_Payne.htm

taught at Harvard were recorded.

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She married with Sergei Gaposchkin, also an astrophysicist, in 1934 and 3 child were born from that marriage. After her marriage, everybody called her as Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin. With her husband and Annie Cannon, she wrote several papers. Sergei and Cecilia made million of observation of variable stars. A very important achievement in her career was the election to the Royal Academy of Science even before her graduation, she held the first awarded Cannon prize in 1934 and she was the first woman to become full professor at Harvard in 1956. In 1943 she entered to the American Academy of Arts and Science, She was awarded with the

Russell prize in 1976. Those are just a few of her awards, but, I believe for the same reasons expressed above, she never be elected to the National Academy of Science. Even with the very well work she done, it was not until 1938 when she get a formal appointment as an astronomer. She was one of the many scientist lived many decades before of their epoch and I think she was a victim of the professional arrogance of the astronomers that were considered “an institution” like Shapley, Eddington, among others. Cecilia Payne and her Husband Sergei.

From: http://store.aip.org/OA_HTML/ibeCCtpItmDspRte.jsp?site=AIP&respid=50212&item=67247

Some of her most important publications are:

• Stellar atmospheres, The Observatory, 1925; Harvard College Observatory, Monographs, no. 1.

• The stars of high luminosity, McGraw-Hill Book Company, Inc., New York, London, 1930.

• Variable stars, The Observatory, Cambridge, 1938. • Variable stars and galactic structure, University of London, Athlone Press,

London, 1954. • The galactic novae, North-Holland Publishing Company: Interscience

Publishers, New York, 1957.

Cecilia Payne was also a great popularizer of astronomy, some of her publications in this field are:

• Stars in the making, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 1952. • Stars and clusters, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 1979.

During his career she received many awards, the following list is an example:

• Henry Norris Russell Award, American Astronomical Society 1976. • National Research Council Fellowship, Harvard College Observatory.

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• Annie Jump Cannon Prize (first winner), 1934. • Merit Award, Radcliffe College, 1952. • Rittenhouse Medal, Franklin Institute, 1961. • Starred in American Men of Science. • Elected Member of the Royal Astronomical Society, 1923. • Member of the American Astronomical Society, 1924. • Member of the American Philosophical Society, 1936. • Member of the la American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1943. • In 1974, Asteroid 1974CA was named Cecilia Payne in her honour.

Doctor “honoris causa” on:

• Wilson College, 1942. • Smith College, 1943. • Western College, 1951. • Colby College, 1958. • Women’s Medical college of Philadelphia, 1961.

The following is a list of her charges and jobs:

1925-27 Research Fellowship, Harvard College Observatory 1927-38 Technical assistant of Harlow Shapley, Harvard College Observatory 1938-56 Phillips Astronomer, Harvard College Observatory 1956-60 Chair of Astronomy, Harvard University 1956-65 Professor of Astronomy, Harvard University 1966-79 Professor Emeritus, Harvard University 1967-79 Astronomer of the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory

References:

(1) http://cannon.sfsu.edu/~gmarcy/cswa/history/cecilia.html

(2) http://www.harvardsquarelibrary.org/unitarians/payne2.html

(3) http://www.physics.ucla.edu/~cwp/Phase2/Payne-Gaposchkin,_Cecilia_Helena@861234567.html (4) http://www.astrogea.org/surveys/Cecilia_Payne.htm