Records of the Harvard College Observatory: records of the Administrative Assistant to Director Donald H. Menzel kept by Velma A. Adams and Helen S. Federer

In 1839, the Harvard Corporation appointed William Cranch Bond, the first Astronomical Observer, to the University, thereby taking the first step in establishing the Harvard College Observatory, after which the first telescope was installed in 1847. Scholars and students had studied astronomy at Harvard since the seventeenth century, but it wasn't until a large comet sparked public interest in 1843 that donors began donating funds to build an observatory. During the tenure of the Harvard College Observatory's first three directors, William Cranch Bond (1839-1859), George Phillips Bond (1859-1865), and Joseph Winlock (1866-1875), the Observatory's research focused on lunar photography and chronometric activities. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, under the direction of Edward C. Pickering (1877-1919), research shifted from celestial mechanics and positional astronomy to astrophysics. As a result, the Observatory developed into a major research institution, focusing on photographic star surveys and spectroscopic analysis, culminating in the publication of the Henry Draper Catalogue, with spectroscopic classifications for 225,300 stars. During Pickering's tenure, many women astronomers, including Annie Jump Cannon, Henrietta Swan Leavitt, Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin, and Williamina Fleming, performed essential research at the Observatory.

During the next several years, the Observatory became an important astronomical training and research center. Harlow Shapley, director from 1921 to 1952, inaugurated a graduate study program in astronomy. Mandating that public education be a part of the Observatory's mission, Shapley required students in the Harvard program to present lectures on astronomy to public school children. Donald H. Menzel (1952-1966) arranged a cooperative relationship with the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (founded in 1890) and its relocation to Cambridge in 1955. Financial support for the Observatory expanded under Leo Goldberg (1966-1970), and in 1973 George B. Field (1972-1983) created an administrative umbrella organization, the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, to coordinate the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory and the Harvard College Observatory's programs. Today, the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics continues studies in astronomy, Earth and space sciences, and science education, while the Harvard College Observatory supports Harvard's Department of Astronomy.

Velma A. Adams was the administrative assistant to the director of the Harvard College Observatory, Donald H. Menzel, from 1951 to 1956.

Helen Spence Federer (1911-1983), astronomer, worked at the Harvard College Observatory in various capacities from 1941 to 1976. With her husband, Charles A. Federer, Jr., Helen published the magazine Sky and Telescope from 1946 to 1956. The magazine was located at the Harvard College Observatory. From 1957 to 1965, Federer was the administrative assistant to the director of the Harvard College Observatory, Donald H. Menzel. She retired from the Observatory in 1976.

Donald Howard Menzel (1901-1976), astronomer and astrophysicist, was the acting director of the Harvard College Observatory from 1952 to 1954 when he was appointed permanent director, a position he held until his retirement in 1966. Menzel's general field of research included astrophysics, specializing in problems related to the sun and the solar system and interpreting stellar and nebular spectra. Under Menzel's leadership, the Harvard College Observatory became a significant radio astronomy and space research center. His most notable achievement was bringing the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory from Washington, D.C., to Cambridge to share facilities with the Harvard College Observatory, which resulted in the establishment of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in 1973.