William Henry Mohoney Christie KCB (1845—1922)
Eighth Astronomer Royal from (1881—1910)
Born: 1845 Woolwich (near Greenwich), London, England
Died: 1922
Buried: at sea (near Gibraltar)
Astronomer Royal: 1881 - 1910
Christie graduated in 1868 from Trinity College Cambridge and in 1870 became
Chief Assistant at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich under Airy before replacing Airy
in 1881 as Astronomer Royal.
Under Christie the Observatory not only continued its work in positional
astronomy but also began a programme of stellar photography and one of making
daily records of solar activity. The Observatory also took part in a number of
international collaborative projects such as the Astrographic Chart and Carte du
Ciel project of mapping the entire sky in both catalogue and photographic form.
Eighteen Observatories were involved in this project from Italy, Finland,
Germany, India, Belgium, France, Algeria, Spain, Mexico, Argentina, Australia,
South Africa and the UK. Christie was also responsible for a number of additions
to the Observatory which included purchasing the 28" telescope still in
working order today.
In 1884 the International Meridian Conference in Washington fixed the Airy
Transit at Greenwich as the location of the Prime Meridian for all the world and
the origin for the Universal Day.
