Signedunsigned
Historical AttributesThis is the flint-glass element of a 10-inch doublet lens that was the rear-end combination of a pair of doublet lenses that made up a photographic refractor paid for by the Boyden Fund. The Boyden Fund was given to Harvard College Observatory in 1887. This instrument was made about 1889 by Alvan Clark & Sons.
The 10-inch Boyden photographic telescope was likely one of the HCO instruments used in the high-altitude observatory in Arequipa, Peru, which was called the Boyden Station. It was used for photography of stars and the like.
After work in the field, the instrument was stored at the Agassiz Station. It was retrieved from there on May 21, 1969.
ProvenanceHarvard College Observatory, purchased circa 1889; gift to CHSI in 1969.
Published ReferencesDeborah Jean Warner and Robert B. Ariail, "Alvan Clark & Sons: Artists in Optics, 2nd ed. (Richmond: Willmann-Bell, 1995), 108, 206.
Bessie Zaban Jones and Lyle Gifford Boyd, The Harvard College Observatory (Cambridge: Belknap Press, 1971).