Caroline Herschel – The Juvenile Instructor (1866)
In honor of International Women’s Day, the Clarence T. Jones Observatory is hosting a Sisterhood of the Stars event this coming Saturday (3/7/25) at 6:30 pm, celebrating the tremendous work of female astronomers throughout history. Since they tee’d me up (resident history buff) with a prompt, I want to take just a moment to highlight my favorite female astronomer, Caroline Herschel.
Caroline was the eighth child born to Isaak and Anna Herschel in Hanover, Germany, in 1750. At the age of 10, a severe case of typhus took Caroline’s sight in her left eye and ensured she would grow no taller than 4’3. The physical trauma she suffered from the disease convinced her parents, her mother particularly, that she would never marry and was destined for a life of domestic servitude. However, her father continued to furtively educate her alongside her brothers, against the wishes of her mother. As a military bandmaster, Isaak imparted enough musical education to his daughter that when she emigrated to join her brothers, William and Alexander, in Bath, England, in 1772, she did so as a concert soloist.
For the rest of her life, Caroline was closely associated with her brother William: first in the concert and music teaching business that her brother ran in addition to his astronomical studies, and later as his assistant when he became the official court astronomer of George III in 1782. Initially, Caroline was resistant to serve as William’s assistant. But with time, she came to share his passion for the geography of the sky.
William Herschel is perhaps best known as the discoverer of the planet Uranus (an event Caroline was present for), made possible by the innovations he made in telescopic technology. However, it is apparent that his career was made possible by Caroline’s constant assistance; a fact recognized by the British government when they gave her a £50 annual salary in 1787, making her the first woman to hold an official government position and the first woman to be paid for her work in astronomy in British history.
Shortly after beginning her work with her brother, Caroline began to make discoveries of her own, including new nebulae and, over the course of her career, eight comets. She also worked for a period of years writing and revising star catalogs, invaluable materials then as now for the study of space.
Following William’s death in 1822, Caroline continued to support the astronomical work of William’s son, John Herschel, alongside her own work, before age and infirmity precluded her from further study. In this latter period of her life, the scientific community at large recognized her for her efforts, and she received a Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society in 1828 and a Prussian Gold Medal for Science in 1846 at the age of 96. She would die a year later, in 1847.
Caroline’s legacy lives on in the astronomical community–two open clusters of stars, a comet, a satellite, and a crater on the moon all bear her name–and as an inspiration for women everywhere, expressed in art such as Adrienne Rich’s “Planetarium,” Judy Chicago’s The Dinner Party, and the 2024 Jay Anderson single ‘Moving’.
While overcoming the prejudices of gender, women in astronomy have helped to orient us in our universe for millennia. Come celebrate stories just like Caroline Herschel this Saturday at the Observatory, as we try to understand not only the secrets of space but each other’s lived experiences.
