Rensselaer Republican, Volume 15, Number 14, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 14 December 1882 — The Transit of Venus. [ARTICLE]

The Transit of Venus.

The cloudr weather in various parts of the country was a great disappointment to many astronomers who had made laborious and elaborate preparations to observe the unusual and infrequent celestial event—the transit of Venus—which occurred on the 6th of December. They know it was the only opportunity they would ever have, for another transit would not occur to/-more than a century to come. The transit was successfully observed at Chicago, where lTois. Hough, Burnham and' Garrison too* .tin- time of the contacts and secured ten photographs. Tbs Irene < astionomrrs at the old fort at St. Auirus--11 nr, Fla are highly satisfied with their labors. The German pirty at Aiken, R C., partially failed In tbelr object Prof. Waldo and his associates at Yale College report satisfactory results. Profs. Wilson securing 160 full plates. At Kan )■ rnneboo forty-eight photographs of the transit were obtained. Prof. Hall, after great difficulty, took 204 photographs at San Antonio, and Prof. Honzeau, the Belgian astronomer, took 20 measurements. The appearance of the planet as it crossed ihe son's disk is described <>y the oi »*crvcrs as fcintply that of a round black spo* with a f moots surface. There were no indications of mountains and volcanoes which tha sue ent astronomers claimed to have seen, hut which have never apt eaied to modern observers, boon after the first contact the whole planet could be seen, and it was surronaded by a f i inge of iivhtdue to its atmosphere, a circumstance which was noticed by tin astronomer* who viewed the transit in 1874. TiiP.ni'. are 84,000 square miles of coal in the Missouri basin-