Edwin Smith

It is little known that the observatory in Gaithersburg had a predecessor. It was in the town of Rockville, Maryland, in the back yard garden of the home of Edwin Smith.

Smith, born in New York in 1851, was self-taught in his field of astronomy and geodesy and his aptitude for this subject enabled him to work with the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey at the young age of 19. By 1879, he had been promoted to Chief of the Instrument Division at the Capitol Hill headquarters for the Coast and Geodetic Survey. It was at this time, that his superintendent, responding to a request from the International Geodetic Association for cooperation in international research on variations of latitude, charged him with establishing an observatory and making the necessary observations.

As luck would have it, Smith had the perfect location in his back yard garden. The small building he constructed had a big role, it actually was the Coast and Geodetic Survey's first astronomical observatory for the study of the variations in latitude.

From all reports, Smith did his observations in a willing manner in addition to his regular work during the day. He observed the stars each night (except when the sky was overcast) from June 13, 1891 until July 9, 1892. During the year of observation, Smith made 1800 individual measures for latitude on 146 nights, many in the bitter cold. His primary career forced him to give up this voluntary activity and the observatory was never used again.

"Seven years later they found what they thought to be a perfect spot. . ."

In 1899, the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey looked for a suitable site which had to have "good averages of clear nights, to have the character of the country the same on the north as on the south of each station, and to have good seismological, hygienic, and social conditions" . They found what they thought to be a perfect spot on the northern corner of Mr. I. T. Fulks farm in Gaithersburg and leased 2.3 acres for 99 years. Mr. Smith was again put in charge of building another observatory.

In his first report on the observatory in 1900, Smith describes the site as "on a summit about 540 feet above tide water. It is some 15,000 feet northwest of the site originally selected, and, though a few feet lower, is in every other respect a better location".

Smith continued the observations in Gaithersburg and sometimes failed to get home at night. A phone was installed to keep him in touch with his family who lived in Rockville. "He had a little cottage in Gaithersburg by the observatory," Smith's daughter Lucy recalls. "It had a wood stove and was nice and cozy during the winter. There were two little rooms with bunk beds. We kids would go up there two at a time with our mother." Miss Lucy had fond recollections of the nights they spent in Gaithersburg. "Dad would let us look through the telescope when he wasn't busy. We loved to gaze at the moon. It looked like a beautiful piece of embroidery".

These nightly observations earned Smith the title "Mr. Astronomer Smith" to distinguish him from another Mr. Smith in Rockville. The Smiths often entertained in their Rockville home and the observatory was quite an attraction. Sometimes, they would hire a horse-drawn bus and take their guests there to gaze at the stars.