Harvard College Observatory photographs of the construction of Agassiz Station

The Harvard College Observatory was founded in 1839 by the Harvard Corporation after decades of attempts to develop an observatory at Harvard University. Under the Observatory's first two directors, William Cranch Bond and his son, George Phillips Bond, the Observatory began an extensive study of the Orion Nebula and Saturn, discovering the eighth satellite of Saturn, Hyperion in 1848; and the dark inner ring of Saturn (the Crepe Ring) in 1850. Pioneers in astrophotography, the Bonds produced the first recognizable daguerreotype of the Moon and the star Vega in 1850; and the first photographic print of the Moon in 1857. The Observatory became the world's foremost producer of stellar spectra and magnitudes, established an observing station in Peru, and applied mass-production techniques to the analysis of data during the directorship of Edward C. Pickering from 1877 to 1919. Harlow Shapley, director of the Observatory in the 1950s, expanded the scope of the Observatory's galactic research tracking minor planets and asteroids in the Solar System and increasing its telescopic power with the establishment of the Oak Ridge station, also known as the George R. Agassiz Station, in Harvard, Massachusetts. In the 1960s and 1970s, Observatory directors Donald H. Menzel and Leo Goldberg maintained programs in solar and stellar astrophysics and space astronomy. In 1973, the Harvard College Observatory and the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (founded in 1890) merged to form the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. The Center is a research institute that carries on studies in astronomy, astrophysics, earth and space sciences, and science education.

The George R. Agassiz Station was established as the Fort Davis Radio Astronomy Station in 1956 by the Harvard College Observatory, with financial assistance from the United States Air Force, and under the leadership of solar radio astronomer Alan Maxwell, in Fort Davis, Texas. The Station focused on radio bursts emanating from flares and sunspots on the solar disk. Construction of a 28-foot radio telescope at the station was completed in 1956 to monitor solar activity and record high intensity radio transmissions from solar flares. In 1961, an 85-foot radio telescope was built and expanded the station’s solar monitoring program by monitoring solar flares and surveying radio sources in the Milky Way. Beginning in March 1972, and continuing throughout the 1970s and the 1980s, the 85-foot radio telescope was implemented in a national Very Long Baseline Interferometry program that collected observations made from telescopes located across the country. In August 1982, the Fort Davis Radio Astronomy Station was officially renamed the George R. Agassiz Station of the Harvard College Observatory.

Alan Maxwell (1926-2021), New Zealander solar radio astronomer, received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Auckland in 1947 and 1949 respectively. Maxwell dedicated his research to the burgeoning field of radio astronomy and is credited with writing the first master’s thesis in the field. Maxwell later earned his PhD from Manchester University in 1953, where he continued to focus his work on radio astronomy and conducted research using antennas.

Maxwell began working at the Harvard College Observatory in 1955 and founded the Observatory’s Radio Astronomy Station in Fort Davis, Texas in 1956. Maxwell developed and led the station’s solar monitoring program until 1982, which included overseeing the construction of two radio telescopes and two solar laboratories over the course of his tenure. Maxwell additionally co-discovered a new type of low-frequency solar radio burst, the “U burst,” with his assistant Govind Swarup in 1958, and worked as a founding editor of the journal Astrophysical Letters from 1967 to 1973. In addition to his work at Harvard, Maxwell was active in multiple international scientific organizations and societies, including as a fellow for the Astronomical Society and the Physical Society of London.