Maria Mitchell lived from 1818-1889 and
was one of the first famous female astronomers. She was born
in Nantucket,Massachusetts,and she went to private schools
all her life. Maria's love for astronomy started when her
father began a small observatory. In October of 1847 she
discovered a telescopic comet that made her famous. The next
year she became the first women elected at the American
Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 1865 she attended Vassar
Collage as a professor of astronomy until she retired in
1888. Nicholas Copernicus, a Polish astronomer,
lived between 1473-1543. He was known well for his
Copernican theory. The theory stated that the earth, which
spun on its axis, revolved annually around the Sun. In
present day, this is known as heliocentric, or sun centered
system. During 1491, Copernicus began going to the
University of Krakow. During January of 1497 he started
studying cannon law at the University of Bologna while
staying with a mathematician named Domenico Maria de Novara.
Novara started Copernicus' interest in geography and
astronomy, and the final decision to be an astronomer came
when the two watched the occultation ( eclipse by the moon )
of the Star Aldebaran on March 9, 1497. Galileo was an Italian astronomer and
physicist. He is often called the founder of modern
"experimental science". Many scientific instruments were
designed by Galileo. First, Galileo studied medicine, and then
changed to mathematics. After he studied math for a while he
began teaching it. In 1589, Galileo was made professor of
Pisa University, and in 1592 he taught at the University of
Padua. He stayed at that university until 1610. Then he
moved to teach privately in Florence. In 1602 Galileo went back to studying the
motion of inclined plains and pendulums. In 1604 Galileo
founded the basic law of falling bodies. He also discovered
that when a supernova appeared, it appeared with the rule of
Aristotle, the change didn't occur in the
heavens. In
1608 Galileo heard about a spy glass that was used to look
at planets, but he wanted to invent something that allowed
people to see the planets better. He didn't really invent
the telescope, though.
A Dutch telescope, called a spy
glass, was invented in 1609. Galileo was so excited that he
began to construct his own
telescopes. In
1613 he discovered that Venus orbited around the sun and not
Earth, and then he discovered that all the planets revolved
around the sun.