First Professor

By the fall of 1865, Maria Mitchell was already the most famous female astronomer in the country. She’d discovered a comet, and become the first woman admitted to two leading scientific societies. And 150 years ago this month, she became the first woman in the country to serve as a professor of astronomy.
Maria Mitchell at her deskMitchell’s father was an amateur astronomer, and he taught Maria how to use a telescope. At age 12, she helped him observe a solar eclipse.
She later became a librarian, and used her free time to study many topics, including astronomy. And at night, she used her father’s telescope to scan the skies.
In 1847, she saw a new comet through the telescope, bringing her nationwide fame. Later, she was hired by the U.S. Nautical Almanac to compute the position of Venus.
When Matthew Vassar founded a new women’s college, in Poughkeepsie, New York, in 1865, Mitchell was the first person he hired for its faculty. She and her father lived in the college’s observatory bui