Born Moor Lane, Bolton, (Greater Manchester), England, 18 June 1799
Died Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, 5 October 1880
William Lassell constructed the first large equatorially mounted reflecting telescopes and proved both the viability and the utility of such large instruments. Using his large reflectors, Lassell discovered several satellites of the outer planets.
The son of Nathaniel Lassell, a timber merchant and Hannah (née Gregson) Lassell, William was raised in middle‐class comfort in a distinctly commercial extended family. He began his education at an elementary school in Bolton and then, at the age of about nine, he entered an academy in Rochdale, Lancashire where Lassell remained for one and a half years. His father died in 1810 while he was still attending school. He started an apprenticeship as a commercial trader in 1814, and by about 1825 he had established himself as a partner in a Liverpool brewing business. Soon afterward, in 1827, he married Maria King of Toxteth.
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Selected References
Andrews, A. D. (1994). “Cyclopaedia of Telescope Makers Part 3 (K–N). ” Irish Astronomical Journal 21: 167–249. (For Lassell, see p. 183.)
Chapman, Allan (1988). “William Lassell (1799–1880): Practitioner, Patron and ‘Grand Amateur’ of Victorian Astronomy. ” Vistas in Astronomy 32: 341–370.
Herschel, J. F. W. (1849). “Address delivered by the President (Sir J. F. W Herschel, Bart.) on presenting the Honorary Medal of the Society to William Lassell.” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 9: 87–92.
Huggins, M. L. (1880). Obituary. Observatory 3: 587–590.
Huggins, William (1881). “William Lassell. ” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 41: 188–191.
——— (1881). “William Lassell, LL.D.” Proceedings of the Royal Society of London 31: vii–x.
Lassell, W. (1842). “Description of an Observatory erected at Starfield, near Liverpool.” Memoirs of the Royal Astronomical Society 12: 265–272.
——— (1874). “On Polishing the Specula of Reflecting Telescopes.” Proceedings of the Royal Society of London 23: 121–123.
Smith, Robert W. and Richard Baum (1984). “William Lassell and the Ring of Neptune: A Case Study in Instrumental Failure.” Journal for the History of Astronomy 15: 1–17.
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McFarland, J. (2007). Lassell, William. In: Hockey, T., et al. The Biographical Encyclopedia of Astronomers. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-30400-7_828
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