Donald Howard Menzel

Donald Howard Menzel (April 11, 1901 – December 14, 1976) was one of the first theoretical astronomers and astrophysicists in the United States.

He discovered the physical properties of the solar chromosphere, the chemistry of stars, the atmosphere of Mars, and the nature of gaseous nebulae.

Born in Florence, Colorado in 1901 and raised in Leadville, he learned to read very early, and soon could send and receive messages in Morse code, taught by his father.

He loved science and mathematics, collected ore and rock specimens, and as a teenager he built a large chemistry laboratory in the cellar.

He made a radio transmitter at a time when kits were rarely available and qualified as a radio ham.

He was an Eagle Scout, specializing in cryptanalysis, as well as an outdoorsman, hiking and fly fishing throughout much of his life.

His interest in astronomy was aroused through a boyhood friend (Edgar Kettering), through observing the solar eclipse of June 8, 1918, and through observing the eruption of Nova Aquilae 1918 (V603 Aquilae).

He graduated from the University of Denver in 1920 with a bachelor's degree in chemistry and stayed on to receive a master's degree in chemistry and mathematics from the institution in 1921.

He also found summer positions in 1922, 1923, and 1924 as research assistant to Harlow Shapley at the Harvard College Observatory.

At Princeton University he acquired a second master's degree in astronomy in 1923, and in 1924 a Ph.D. in astrophysics for which his advisor was Henry Norris Russell, who inspired his interest in theoretical astronomy.

Menzel observed many total solar eclipses, often leading the expeditions, including Catalina, California (10 September 1923, cloudy), Camptonville, California (28 April 1930), Fryeburg, Maine (31 August 1932), Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota (30 June 1954), the Atlantic coast of Massachusetts (2 October 1959), northern Italy (15 February 1951), Orono, Maine (20 July 1963, cloudy), Athens/Sunion Road, Greece (20 May 1966), Arequipa, Peru (12 November 1966), Miahuatlan, south of Oaxaca, Mexico (7 March 1970), Prince Edward Island Canada (10 July 1972), and western Mauritania (30 June 1973), in addition to the other three mentioned above.

He proudly held the informal record for greatest number of observed solar eclipses, a "title" later broken by his student, colleague, and co-author Jay Pasachoff.

He married Florence Elizabeth Kreager on June 17, 1926.

They had two daughters, Suzanne Kay and Elizabeth Ina.

At 16, he enrolled in the University of Denver to study chemistry.

After teaching for two years at the University of Iowa and Ohio State University, in 1926 he was appointed assistant professor at Lick Observatory of the University of California in San Jose, California, where he worked for several years.

In the late 1930s he built an observatory for solar research at Climax, CO, using a telescope that mimicked a total eclipse of the sun, allowing him and his colleagues to study the solar corona and to film the spouting flames, called prominences, emitted by the Sun.

Menzel initially performed solar research, but later concentrated on studying gaseous nebulae.

His work with Lawrence Aller and James Gilbert Baker defined many of the fundamental principles of the study of planetary nebulae.

He moved to Harvard University in 1932.

During World War II, Menzel was commissioned as a lieutenant commander in the United States Navy and asked to head a division of intelligence, where he used his many-sided talents, including deciphering enemy codes.

Menzel was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1934, the American Philosophical Society in 1943, and the United States National Academy of Sciences in 1948.

On 19 June 1936, he led the Harvard-MIT expedition to the steppes of Russia (at Ak Bulak in southwestern Siberia) to observe a total eclipse.

He received honorary A.M. and Sc.D. degrees from Harvard University in 1942 and the University of Denver in 1954 respectively.

For the 9 July 1945 eclipse, he directed the Joint U.S.-Canadian expedition to Saskatchewan, although they were clouded out.

From 1946 to 1948 he was the vice president of the American Astronomical Society, becoming their president from 1954 to 1956.

Returning to Harvard after the war, he was appointed acting director of the Harvard Observatory in 1952, and was the full director from 1954 to 1966.

His colleague Dr. Dorrit Hoffleit recalls one of his first actions in the position was asking his secretary to destroy a third of the plates sight unseen, resulting in their permanent loss from the record.

The term "Menzel Gap" was used to refer to the 1953–1968 absence of astronomical photographic plates when plate-making operations were temporarily halted by Menzel as a cost-cutting measure.

Even until 1955, he worked with the Navy improving radio-wave propagation by tracking the Sun's emissions and studying the effect of the aurora on radio propagation for the Department of Defense (Menzel & Boyd, p. 60 ).

From 1964 to his death, Menzel was a U.S. State Department consultant for Latin American affairs.

He wrote the first edition (1964) of A Field Guide to the Stars and Planets, part of the Peterson Field Guides.

In one of his last papers, Menzel concluded, based on his analysis of the Schwarzschild equations, that black holes do not exist, and he declared them to be a myth.

He also believed in the EPH (exploded planet hypothesis), stating, 'Presque toutes ces petites planètes circulent entre les orbites de Mars et Jupiter.

On admet qu'elles représentent les fragments dispersés d'une grande planète qui se serait désintégrée.'

In 1965, Menzel was given the John Evans Award of the University of Denver.

Menzel was a science fiction author; his "Fin's Funeral" appeared in Galaxy Science Fiction in 1965.

He retired from Harvard in 1971.

In May 2001, the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian hosted "Donald H. Menzel: Scientist, Educator, Builder," a symposium in honor of the 100th anniversary of the birth of Donald H. Menzel.

Menzel traveled with several expeditions to view solar eclipses to obtain scientific data.