The Royal Observatory at the Cape of Good Hope has been part of Cape Town for nearly two hundred years. It is the oldest scientific institution in South Africa, if not in all of Africa. The extensive SAAO collections of instruments and historical images have been drawn upon to present a vivid account from its foundation in 1820 to the present day.
Main Building of the South African Astronomical Observatory. Source: Wikipedia
Origins and Establishment
The official establishment of the Royal Observatory, Cape of Good Hope occurred on 20 October 1820 through an Order in Council of King George IV of the United Kingdom. The proposal for a Southern observatory in all likelihood originated among the same group of people who founded the Royal Astronomical Society in the United Kingdom. In accordance with its mandate, the principal activity of the Observatory was astrometry, and it was over its existence responsible for publishing many catalogues of star positions.
The institution was located on a small hill 5 kilometres (3.1 miles) south-east from the centre of Cape Town. During the succeeding century a suburb of the city formed in the area; the suburb was named Observatory after the pre-existing Royal Observatory.
Early Challenges and Developments
When the Reverend Fearon Fallows arrived at the Cape, he found himself landed in the wrong place (Simon’s Town) and with no way of getting his cargo of astronomical instruments to Cape Town except by putting them on another ship at his own expense. In Cape Town the British authorities not only refused all payment of ‘one penny’ of Fallows’ expenses on land or sea, but refused to give the observatory instruments any storage space.
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As it was, Fallows was allowed a room in the town granary, and the government eventually granted him one of the pre-fabricated huts intended for settlers at Algoa Bay. From this hut (originally in Kloof Street) Fallows began observing the southern stars. His results from these early observations appeared as a catalogue of 273 ‘principal fixed Stars’ in the 1824 Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society.
But getting the permanent observatory built was another matter. Most possible sites were plagued by sand and dust storms or local ‘tablecloth’ clouds, and finding a site took nearly a year. When a contractor was finally found in 1825, the building was somewhat hampered because ‘we had only two or three stone Masons in the Colony’, while the less skilled labourers were ‘the most idle and unprincipled set of men I ever witnessed’. Ten soldiers had to guard the site so that tools and materials didn’t disappear every night.
There were no dust storms because the building site was between the swampy areas created by the Liesbeek and the Black River, on a barren rocky mound crossed by cattle trails - and justly known as Snake Hill. Thirty tons of lead for the roof had to be moved over bad roads to the new building, as well as huge stones for mounting the permanent instruments. Teak for construction had to be purchased quietly so that the merchant who owned the only available supply didn’t raise the price beyond reach.
Royal Observatory in about 1834, looking towards Devil’s Peak. Source: sahistory.org.za
Key Discoveries and Contributions
The Royal Observatory was responsible for a number of significant events in the history of astronomy. The second HM Astronomer, Thomas Henderson, aided by his assistant, Lieutenant William Meadows, made the first observations that led to a believable stellar parallax, namely of Alpha Centauri. In 1882, David Gill obtained long-exposure photographs of the great comet of that year showing the presence of stars in the background. This led him to undertake in collaboration with J.C. Kapteyn of Groningen the Cape Photographic Durchmusterung, the first stellar catalogue prepared by photographic means.
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In 1886, he proposed to Admiral A.E.B. Mouchez of Paris Observatory the holding of an international congress to promote a photographic catalogue of the whole sky. In 1887 this congress took place in Paris and resulted in the Carte du Ciel project. The Cape Observatory was assigned the zone between declinations −40° and −52°. In 1911, J.K.E. Halm, then the Chief Assistant, put forward a pioneering paper on stellar dynamics in which he hypothesized that the star streams discovered by Kapteyn arose from a Maxwellian distribution of stellar velocities.
David Gill’s career in astronomy began when he installed a 12-inch reflecting telescope in his father’s garden, and used it to take an ‘exceptionally good’ photograph of the Moon. A leading British astronomer kept his copy of Gill’s photograph mounted in his dining room window for the rest of his life, and a visitor who saw it offered Gill his first professional post in astronomy. Three years after becoming director of the Royal Observatory at the Cape, Gill found it possible to photograph the great comet of 1882 - and many faint stars in the same field.
Mapping the sky had always meant measuring star positions one by one. The comet pictures suggested that a single photograph might record thousands of stars. Before long Gill was involved in organising a massive international effort to produce a detailed photographic ‘Map of the Heavens’. As a first step, he also embarked on a less ambitious photographic survey of the southern sky from the Cape - paying much of the cost himself.
To end uncertainty about the distance of the Sun, Gill led an international effort to measure the exact positions of three asteroids (minor planets) as seen from different parts of the Earth. He also attacked the problem spectroscopically, measuring the changing velocities of bright stars as the Earth moved around the Sun. Work at the Cape also produced improved measurements of the mass of Jupiter and of the Moon.
Gill’s distances to other stars were ‘. . . the only reliable determinations . . . ever made in the Southern Hemisphere . . . almost . . . For a newspaper interview, Gill compared his accuracy in measuring star positions to measuring a threepenny piece a hundred miles away (which prompted the comment that only a Scot would be worried about a threepenny piece at that distance).
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When Gill first arrived, he found an observatory with limited, aging equipment, so poorly maintained that bees were taking over one wing of the main building. When he left, the observatory was investigating the physical nature of stars with large modern (1901) refractors. His quadrupled staff included ladies to measure photographic plates, West African ‘Kroomen’ and specialist experts on double stars and on spectroscopy (the art of estimating chemical composition, temperature, etc. from the intensities of the rainbow colours of a spectrum). In 1907, the Royal Observatory at the Cape of Good Hope was the finest observatory in the southern hemisphere.
Gill’s successors developed the programmes he had begun. The motions of tens of thousands of stars were measured, and the distances to over 1600 nearby stars. Sir Harold Spencer Jones (HM Astronomer at the Cape 1923-1933) organised a collaboration of 24 observatories worldwide to remeasure the distance to the Sun by observing the position of the minor planet Eros during an unusually close approach to the Earth. The 1153 Cape photographs of Eros were the ‘longest and best distributed series taken at any observatory’.
Integration and Modernization
In the 20th century it turned in part towards astrophysics, but by the nineteen-fifties the city lights of Cape Town had rendered work on faint objects impossible and a new site in the Karoo semi-desert was sought. An agreement to facilitate this was ratified on 23 September 1970. Nevertheless, several telescopes remained in operation until the 1990s. These are rarely made use of today except for public outreach events.
In 1959, the Royal Observatory at the Cape of Good Hope became a branch of the Royal Greenwich Observatory, Herstmonceux. It remained a separate entity until 1972 when it was amalgamated with the Republic Observatory Johannesburg to form the present-day South African Astronomical Observatory.
On 23 September 1970, it was announced that agreement had been reached between the SRC and the CSIR for a joint astronomical adventure covering a minimum period of 15 years, involving the creation of a new observing station at Sutherland and the pooling of manpower and equipment from the Cape Observatory and the Republic Observatory in Johannesburg. At the same time, it was announced that the new observing station together with the Cape Observatory (as its administrative centre) were to be known as the South African Astronomical Observatory, and would come into operation on 1 January 1972 under the directorship of Woolley who was due to retire as Astronomer Royal at the end of 1971.
Headquarters are in the old Royal Observatory buildings in Cape Town. The three most modern telescopes from the two observatories found a new home on a Karoo koppie just off the road between Sutherland and Fraserburg.
The Royal Observatory Today
The original buildings now serve as the headquarters of the South African Astronomical Observatory, with an on-site museum exhibiting various historic instruments and telescopes. Every second and fourth Saturday of the month at 8pm visitors are invited to an evening programme which includes a talk, an introduction to the Historic McClean Telescope and the observatory museum, as well as the observatory Building. If the weather is clear, you’ll get a chance to observe the night sky through the McClean and other telescopes.
The former spectroscopic laboratory of the McClean telescope was converted into a museum in 1987, retaining the original 19th-century fittings.
His/Her Majesty's Astronomers at the Cape
The Royal Observatory's directors were known as His or Her Majesty's Astronomers at the Cape.
- Thomas Henderson
- Charles Piazzi Smyth 1835-1845
- William Lewis Elkin 1881-1883
- Frank McClean 1895-1897
- Willem de Sitter 1897-1899
- Robert Thorburn Ayton Innes 1897-1903
- Jakob Karl Ernst Halm 1907-1927
- Joan George Erardus Gijsbertus Voûte
- Alan William James Cousins 1947-1971
- David Stanley Evans 1951-1968
Architectural Legacy
The building was designed by Sir Herbert Baker and was completed in 1897. The architecture of Sir Herbert Baker is widespread.
Key Buildings:
- Main Building, completed 1828. Greek revival style; Architect John Rennie.
- Photoheliograph building, 1849 (formerly 7-inch Merz telescope building).
- Heliometer, 1888 (now containing 18-inch reflector).
- McClean, 1896, designed by Herbert Baker and laboratory (now Astronomical Museum). Hydraulically driven rising floor. Dome by T. Cooke & Sons.
- Astrographic, 1889.
- Reversible Transit Circle 1905 (6-inch).
Historically, the main building contained a 10 feet focal length Transit by Dollond and a 6-feet Mural Circle by Thomas Jones. These were replaced by in 1855 by an 8-inch Transit Circle designed by George Biddell Airy, Astronomer Royal at Greenwich.
The Suburb of Observatory
Observatory was a residential suburb of Cape Town, and derived its name from the Royal Observatory, which was established there in 1821. Observatory is situated on the north-facing lower slopes of Devil's Peak. Observatory is a suburb in Cape Town, South Africa, colloquially known as Obs.
Bordered by Mowbray to the south and Salt River to the northwest, the area is best known as a student neighbourhood associated with the nearby University of Cape Town and Groote Schuur Hospital. It's an arty district locally known as 'Obs'.
Modern-day Observatory traces its origins to the Koornhoop Colony land grant issued in 1657. Between February 1657 and February 1658, fourteen free burghers were granted land by the Dutch East India Company along the Liesbeeck River valley. The then governor of the Cape, Jan van Riebeek, decreed that a fortified building called "Fort Coornhoop" be built as one of several small forts to protect against the Khoikhoi.
The main entertainment area is centered around the Lower Main Road. Most restaurants and retail shops are located along Lower Main Road, and there is a shopping complex and supermarket in St Peter’s Square, which is opposite Groote Schuur graveyard.
During the years of apartheid, Observatory was one of the few de facto 'grey' suburbs where all races lived together. It continues to be a somewhat alternative part of town, with 'New Age' stores including an anarchist store, and several programmes at the Observatory Community Centre. The suburb's proximity to the University of Cape Town (UCT) and its medical school in particular, has always made it popular with both students and faculty.
Observatory has long been a vibrant area, as a result of its high proportion of students. There are numerous restaurants and bars, and many neighbourhood staples. Most restaurants and retail shops are located along Lower Main road with a 95-year-old bottle store, Observatory Liquors, situated in the middle.
Observatory has a soccer and hockey stadium below the station, Hartleyvale Stadium which is flanked on one side by Liesbeeck Parkway and on the other by Willow Road.
In November 2009, the Observatory Improvement District was launched to enhance the suburb with better security and maintenance. Beyond the astronomical observatory is Valkenberg psychiatric hospital, a Victorian heritage building that has recently undergone extensive renovations. Valkenberg houses the mentally ill in secure accommodation, as well as providing out patient care.
The Groote Schuur Hospital looms over the suburb, and is the hospital where Professor Chris Barnard performed the world's first heart transplant, on 3 December 1967.
As with most of South African urban spaces, crime is a problem, with burglary and muggings. In the past decade there were several murders, however security has now improved with active local civic participation. Large CCTV cameras have been erected at most of the exits and entrances to Obs.
In 2021, Amazon announced that it would be the main tenant and investor in a 15 hectares (37 acres) site in Cape Town along the Salt, Black and Liesbeek Rivers that is being turned into an expansive complex with residences, shops, a hotel, conference centre and a business park. It is expected to become the African headquarters for Amazon, which hopes to base its expanding operations in Africa.
Sutherland - A visit to the South African Astronomical Observatory
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