LtE in CMO #254

From  William SHEEHAN

@. . . . . . . . . Dear Masatsugu,

 Apologies for the delay of several days in responding to your e-mail messages of December 3 -- I have wanted to wait until I had time to give them the attention they deserve.

 

 I appreciate your kindness in writing on my behalf to your colleague Naoya Matsumoto, at Nagasaki.  I will be interested to hear what he can find out about Janssen's (and the American) transit expedition in 1874.  Janssen used his "revolver camera" at the transit, and also took many pictures of Japan and its people, which are in the Musée de l'Homme.  These would be worth cataloging; I hope to reproduce some of them in the transit book.

 

 So far no one seems to know of any images that survived of Venus at the 1874 transit, though there are some -- eleven, to be exact -- at the U.S.  Naval Observatory showing its appearance at the 1882 transit.  It is possible that some of Janssen's images have survived.  I have not yet had a chance to check at the Conservatoire or the Société de Cinématographie.

 

 In addition to the images of Janssen in my Mars book, you may find others of interest that are reproduce on google.com.

 

 It may be possible to have a conference of some kind related to Janssen's transit Venus to Japan.

 

 Regarding Mars -- it is well out of reach of easy observation, and I have consigned it to the Masatsugu Minamis and Don Parkers of this world.

 

 I greatly appreciate the images of Saheki and yourself -- I have printed a copy of this and put it in a frame in my desk as a memento of our friendship, until such time as, hopefully, we shall meet in person.

 

 With all kind regards,

(8 December 2001 email)

  Bill SHEEHAN  (MN, USA )

sheehanbr@tds.net

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