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Sophia Hazel Levy McDonald (1888-1963) Sophia Hazel Levy McDonald viewed herself as somewhat of a pioneer for women in the field of study and research in the exact sciences. She contributed to the fame of the UC Berkeley Astronomy Department and contributed significantly to the teaching of mathematics in California. If Helen of Sparta/Troy was "the face that launched 1,000 ships", then Sophia H. Levy McDonald could arguably be "the mind that downed 1,000s of aircraft". Sophia Hazel Levy was born on 12 December 1888, in Alameda, California, daughter of native Californians Alexander Jay Levy (born 1855 in Coloma) and Sarah Horabin Levy (born 1861 in Shirt-tail Canyon). Sophia attended UC Berkeley, became interested in astronomy, and graduated in 1910 with a B.S. major in astronomy. In 1920 she was awarded a Ph.D. in astronomy by UC Berkeley, thereby succeeding Anna Estelle Glancy and Phoebe Waterman to become the third woman to earn a UC astronomy doctorate. She contibuted many theoretical astronomy papers dealing with motions of comets and minor planets. She was an excellent and extensive computer. Candidates for higher degrees in astronomy also performed computations under her direction. Some of these results led to a redetermination of the mass of Jupiter. Many of her publications, appeared as Lick Observatory bulletins. An early work with Professor A. O. Leuschner and Anna Glancy, Part II of "Tables of Minor Planets Discovered by James C. Watson" appeared in the Memoris of the National Academy of Sciences, Volume 14, No. 3, 158 pages, 1920. Sophia's competence in mathematics was recognized by her appointments: Instructor in Mathematics (1923), Assistant Professor (1925), Associate Professor (1940) and Professor of Mathematics (1949). Since her astronomy work required extensive numerical data, she naturally directed herself to the field of numerical analysis. As a member of the Mathematics Department she contributed to the training of several hundred engineering students every year. During World War II, she was Director of Mathematics Instruction for the Army Specialized Training Program at UC Berkeley and taught many courses in antiaircraft gunnery for men stationed at defence positions. This work resulted in the publication of Introductory Artillery Mathematics and Antiaircraft Mathematics (1943). Professor McDonald contributed to the teaching of mathematics in schools. For more than thirty years she advised prospective mathematics teachers and planned programs to meet their needs and satisfy University and state requirements. She was a frequent speaker before teachers' institute groups. She served as a member of the sub-committee on mathematics of the California committee for the study of education and also as a member of the committee on the preparation of secondary school mathematics teachers. As an extracurricular activity, she collected dolls of all types from all over the world and exhibited them to the delight of viewers. Sophia Levy married Professor John Hector McDonald upon his retirement in 1944 from the Mathematics Department. Professor Sophia Levy McDonald retired as Professor Emeritus in 1954 and died in Oakland, California, on 6 December 1963. Memberships and honors include:
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Virginia Trimble Virginia Trimble is Professor of Physics and Astronomy at UC Irvine and the oldest member of the department still on active duty. Virginia sponsored the Observational Astronomy Workshops in: 2013 & 2014 (in honor of Mary Lea & C. Donald Shane); 2015 (in honor of Rudolph L. Minkowski); 2016 (in honor of George H. Herbig); 2017 (in honor of Robert P. Kraft); 2018 (in honor of Anna Estelle Glancy & Emma Phoebe Waterman Hass); 2019 (in honor of Virginia Frances Farmer Trimble and Roy Stanley Farmer); 2020 (in honor of Margaret Burbidge); 2021 (in honor of Guido Münch & Lodewijk Woltjer). Virginia is a graduate of Hollywood High School, UCLA, and Caltech (PhD 1968) and holds an honorary M.A. degree from the University of Cambridge (UK) and dottora honoris causa from the University of Valencia (Spain). She has been involved in governance in AAS, APS, IAU, IUPAP, PBK, Sigma Xi, ASP and some other organizations and is currently interested in the structure and evolution of stars, galaxies, and the universe, and of the communities of scientists who study them. As a student at CalTech, Trimble modelled for Richard P. Feynman's artwork. For 16 years, Trimble read every astronomical paper published in 23 journals. Preceded by Vera Rubin, Trimble was the second woman to be granted research time with the 200-inch Hale telescope on Palomar mountain. Since the 1960s, as the spouse of gravitational wave astronomy pioneer Joseph Weber, Virginia has been integral to the development and fruition of this major new field, as acknowleged during the 2016-02-11 NSF press conference announcing the first direct detection of gravitational waves by the LIGO instrument. See also Weber and Trimble, chapter 9 of Janna Levin's (2016) book: Black Hole Blues and Other Songs from Outer Space. |
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Elinor Gates Elinor is a staff astronomer at Lick Observatory specializing in laser guide star adaptive optics and near infrared camera instrumentation and observations. She received her Ph.D. in Physics/Astronomy from the University of New Mexico in 1998. Her current research interests are studying quasars and their host galaxies. |
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Paul Lynam Paul is a staff astronomer at Lick Observatory. An amateur astronomer since childhood, after UK-based undergraduate studies, master's research and a Ph.D. in astrophysics (2000), he spent three years at the Max-Planck-Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics (MPE, Germany). Having attended research observatories worldwide, he then joined the European Southern Observatory (ESO, Germany) and two years later, relocated to Chile, supporting operations of the Very Large Telescope (VLT). He continued as a VLT operations astronomer until late 2010. His research includes giant galaxies, clusters of galaxies, large-scale structure and "cosmic flows." |
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Jon Rees Jon is a staff astronomer at Lick Observatory. He received a Ph.D. in Physics from the University of Exeter in 2016, focussed on observations of young star clusters. He completed a joint postdoc position at the University of Arizona/UC San Diego, followed by a stint as observatory manager at New Mexico State University before joining Lick. His research interests cover the evolution of young stars, low-mass stars in globular clusters, and brown dwarfs. |
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Patrick Maloney Pat Maloney has been actively involved with Astronomy since he ground an 8-inch mirror and built his first telescope as a high school freshman. He has operated telescopes for public viewing programs at various colleges and universities. He currently teaches astronomy labs at Santa Clara University. For many years, Pat has also operated the 36-inch and 40-inch telescopes for Lick Observatory’s summer evening programs. |
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