BornNew York, New York, USA, 17 December 1897
DiedChocorua, New Hampshire, USA, 3 April 1984
American physicist, astronomer, and physician Theodore Dunham, Jr., developed coudé spectrographs at Mount Wilson Observatory and at Mount Stromlo Observatory in Australia; introduced the Schmidt camera in spectroscopy; studied stellar atmospheres, interstellar material, and planetary atmospheres; identified CO2in the atmosphere of Venus; developed photoelectric detectors for spectroscopy; and applied physical methods to research in medicine and surgery.
Dunham’s interest in astronomy began early. The son of Theodore Dunham, a surgeon, and Josephine Balestier Dunham, he prepared at Saint Bernard’s School and the Browning School, New York City. As a teenager, Dunham submitted data to the American Association of Variable Star Observers, and by the age of 17, he had built an observatory on the grounds of his family’s cottage in Northeast Harbor, Maine, where his father practiced medicine in the...
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Selected References
De Vorkin, David M. (2000). Henry Norris Russell:Dean of American Astronomers. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press.
Dunham, Theodore, Jr. (1929). “The Spectrum of Alpha Persei.” Contributions from the Princeton University Observatory, no. 9.
— Oral History Interviews with David M. DeVorkin, 30 April 1977 and 19 April 1978. Niels Bohr Library, American Institute of Physics, College Park, Maryland.
— Microfilm of Scientific Papers. Niels Bohr Library, American Institute of Physics, College Park, Maryland.
Dunham, Theodore, Jr. and Walter S. Adams (1932). “Absorption Bands in the Infra-Red Spectrum of Venus.” Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific44: 243.
Dunham, Jr., Theodore, and T. W. Richards (1921). “The Effect of Changing Hydrogen-ion Concentration on the Potential of the Zinc Electrode.” Journal of the American Chemical Society43.
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Dunham, W.B. (2014). Dunham, Theodore Jr.. In: Hockey, T., et al. Biographical Encyclopedia of Astronomers. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-9917-7_390
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