John Flamsteed Bio

John Flamsteed was born in Denby, Derbyhshire, England on August 19, 1646. Flamsteed grew up and went to school there while his father held a malting business nearby. Flamsteed was well educated in Latin from Derby School, and therefore was able to read the literature of the day. He also had a passion for history. He left Derby school around May in 1662. He then tried to attend Jesus College in Cambridge but was unable due to a previous health condition. During this time, Flamsteed began to pick up his love for math and astronomy. He was absolutely fascinated by a partial solar eclipse he observed in 1662. This peaked his interest enough to cause him to embrace the subject. While he was at home with his father, his father taught Flamsteed how to do arithmetic and handle fractions. He began reading books about astronomy, all the while picking up more mathematics. Flamsteed then became to make local friends that were astronomers. He talked to William Lichford who had astronomical books and data. The astronomical tables he was able to look at fascinated him and only encouraged him to pursuer astronomy further. At age nineteen, Flamsteed wrote his first essay called Mathematical Essays. This essay explained about the construction and use of an astronomical quadrant. He attended Jesus college for a short while and was able to hear Isaac Newton speak. He was later invited to London to be commissioned as the British Royal Astronomer. He moved on to the Greenwich Observatory and worked there until 1684. His final years were spent as a priest until he died in 1719. Flamsteed’s work included predictions of solar eclipses which he accurately predicted in the 1660’s. He is also credited with some of the first sightings of Uranus, even though he mislabeled it as a star. Although unknown to Flamsteed, he sighted the most recent supernova in the galaxy and cataloged it as a star. He titled the star Cassiopea 3. However, astronomers today find that the position he observed of the supernova may have just been a miscataloged star.  He created star catalogs that ended up tripling the number of entries as Tycho Brahe. However, Flamsteed was in fear of presenting data that was not verified. His work was published by Isaac Newton after being stolen by Newton. After his death, Flamsteed’s crowning achievement, Historia Coelestis Britannica, was published. It had almost 3000 stars cataloged, and was extremely accurate. His achievements in life were rewarded with several honors. He was made the first British Royal Astronomer, a fellow of the Royal Society, has a crater on the moon named after him, an asteroid named after him, and many schools in his hometown have been named after him.