Ask Fuzzy: Who was Williamina Fleming?

As an Ask Fuzzy reader, (studies show) they know that the next word from Men in Black should be "Belt".

The row of three stars in Orion's Belt form one of the most distinctive constellations visible in the southern hemisphere. And, just to the south of the easternmost star called Alnitak, lies another of the most beautiful and well-known features of the night sky.

Unfortunately the Horsehead Nebula is not visible to the naked eye, but with the right equipment it is easily photographed and one of the best-known images in astronomy.

It looks like a seahorse silhouetted against tendrils of colourful wispy clouds.

In 1888, Williamina Fleming (1857-1911) was analysing photographic plates when she noticed a curiosity, which she recorded as "a semicircular indentation five minutes in diameter".

The Horsehead Nebula is in fact a dark, complex cloud of dust and gas where stars are born.

The deep-red originates from ionised hydrogen gas which glows in the light of the nearby star Sigma Orionis, while magnetic fields whip the gases into streams.

Williamina Fleming's life ran a circuitous path into the world of astronomy.

Born in Scotland, she and her unborn child were abandoned by her husband not long after they arrived in the United States.

Needing employment, she became a maid in the home of Edward Pickering, director at the Harvard College Observatory, who soon noticed her lively intellect.

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One day, frustrated with his staff, Pickering quipped, "My Scottish maid could do better!"

Aided by a bequest from the widow of amateur astronomer Henry Draper, Pickering was able to fund a team to catalogue the heavens.

Each night, astronomers would photograph the sky while, by day, the women they called "computers" would analyse the images.

Picking put Fleming in charge of the team who went on to classify tens of thousands of stars and white dwarfs.

Fleming herself is credited with discovering 10 novae, 59 gaseous nebulae including the Horsehead Nebula, and more than 300 variable stars.

She was also among the first to observe the strange, hot, Earth-sized stars that we now know are white dwarfs.

In 1898 Williamina Fleming received an ovation from a national gathering of astronomers in recognition of her heroic work.

Listen to the Fuzzy Logic Science Show at 11am every Sunday on 2XX 98.3FM.

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