25 Facts About James Dunlop

James Dunlop FRSE was a Scottish astronomer, noted for his work in Australia.

James Dunlop was employed by Sir Thomas Brisbane to work as astronomer's assistant at his private observatory, once located at Paramatta, New South Wales, about 23 kilometres west of Sydney during the 1820s and 1830s.

James Dunlop later became the Superintendent of Paramatta Observatory when it was finally sold to the New South Wales Government.

James Dunlop was born in Dalry, Ayrshire, Scotland, the son of John Dunlop, a weaver, and his wife Janet, nee Boyle.

James Dunlop was educated at a primary school in Dalry and went to work at a thread factory in Beith when he was 14.

James Dunlop attended a night-school in Beith kept by a man named Gardiner.

James Dunlop became interested in astronomy at an early age and was constructing telescopes in 1810.

James Dunlop was not a professionally trained astronomer, so he importantly lacked the necessary mathematical skills to do astrometric reductions.

James Dunlop had soon learned the necessary observational skills from the more able Rumker and his employer.

Between June 1823 and February 1826 James Dunlop then made 40,000 observations and catalogued some 7,385 stars, of which included 166 double stars and references to several bright deep-sky objects near the bright stars he catalogued.

James Dunlop left Sydney for Scotland in February 1827 and was employed for four years at the observatory of Sir Thomas Brisbane.

James Dunlop had done very good work as an observer in New South Wales, and was associated with Rumker in the recovery of Comet Encke at Parramatta in June 1822.

James Dunlop was later to be the first in Great Britain to rediscover this comet on 26 October 1829.

James Dunlop had been awarded the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society of London on 8 February 1828.

James Dunlop was selected mainly from his good knowledge of Colony and the observatory site, but the real reason for his selection was more because even though such an astronomical position was formally advertised, nobody applied for the astronomical tenure.

James Dunlop arrived at Sydney on 6 November 1831 and found the observatory in a deplorable condition; rain had entered the building, roofing plaster had fallen down, and many important records were destroyed.

James Dunlop succeeded in getting the building repaired and started on his work with energy, but around 1835 his health began to fail; he had no assistant, and the building, having been attacked by white ants, fell gradually into decay.

In 1816 James Dunlop married his cousin Jean Service, who survived him.

James Dunlop was awarded medals for his work by the King of Denmark in 1833, and the Institut Royal de France in 1835.

James Dunlop was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1832, his proposer being Sir Thomas Makdougall Brisbane.

James Dunlop published scientific papers on his observations in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, the Edinburgh Journal of Science, and the Transactions of the Royal Society between the years 1823 and 1839.

James Dunlop made several noteworthy discoveries in the Southern Hemisphere sky and in 1828 published A Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters of Stars in the Southern Hemisphere observed in New South Wales, which contains 629 objects.

James Dunlop found many new open star clusters, globular clusters, bright nebulae and planetary nebulae, most previously unknown to visual observers.

James Dunlop died on 22 September 1848 at Boora Boora near Gosford in New South Wales.

James Dunlop is buried within the grounds of St Paul's Anglican Church in Kincumber, New South Wales.