Join us for a very interesting 45 minute presentation by Richard Westwood.

Without spectroscopy, we would know little about the Universe we live in: in fact, it is today at the forefront of science, along with JWST, in its task of revealing the very dawn of the Universe.

Our discovery of spectroscopy is a fascinating human story, one of experimentation, theory, perseverance, and interesting characters: especially the group of talented ladies who, by studying glass plates, gave us the stellar spectral sequence we use today.

This presentation reveals the characters involved and how we learned to interpret these curious "lines" of the spectrum, we see their triumphs and struggles – and their sense of humor, as they carried out this painstaking work.

The conference also commemorates the bicentenary of one of these pioneers – Sir William Huggins, the son of a silk merchant, who as an amateur astronomer became one of the leading experts in the field in the 1870s. His observatory at Tulse Hill, south London, housed an 8-inch refractor, which he devoted to spectroscopy.

He was president of the Royal Astronomical Society from 1876 to 1878.

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