Discovery and Subsequent Studies
944 Hidalgo was discovered by Walter Baade on October 31, 1920 at Bergedorf Observatory near Hamburg, Germany. It is named for Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, who was responsible for declaring Mexico's independence in 1810 and the ensuing Mexican War of Independence. German astronomers who were in Mexico to observe a total eclipse on September 10, 1923, had an audience with President Álvaro Obregón. During this meeting, they asked his permission to name the asteroid after Hidalgo y Costilla.
It was one of five minor planets included in the 1993 study, Transition Comets -- UV Search for OH Emissions in Asteroids, which was research involving amateur astronomers who were permitted to make use of the Hubble Space Telescope.
In the late 1990s, a network of astronomers worldwide gathered lightcurve data that was ultimately used to derive the spin states and shape models of 10 new asteroids, including 944 Hidalgo. Lightcurve data has also been recorded by observers at the Antelope Hills Observatory, which has been designated as an official observatory by the Minor Planet Center.
When Pluto was discovered Hidalgo was the furthest known asteroid from the Sun.
Read more about this topic: 944 Hidalgo
Famous quotes containing the words discovery and, discovery, subsequent and/or studies:
“The new supplants the old. Yet men’s minds are stuffed with outworn bunk. Educating the young in the latest findings of authorities and scholars in the social sciences is important. It is equally important to devise ways and means for aiding the middle-aged and old to reexamine hang-over unscientific doctrines and ideas in the light of recent discovery and research.”
—Mary Barnett Gilson (1877–?)
“It was one of those evenings when men feel that truth, goodness and beauty are one. In the morning, when they commit their discovery to paper, when others read it written there, it looks wholly ridiculous.”
—Aldous Huxley (1894–1963)
“... the outcome of the Clarence Thomas hearings and his subsequent appointment to the Supreme Court shows how misguided, narrow notions of racial solidarity that suppress dissent and critique can lead black folks to support individuals who will not protect their rights.”
—bell hooks (b. c. 1955)
“You must train the children to their studies in a playful manner, and without any air of constraint, with the further object of discerning more readily the natural bent of their respective characters.”
—Plato (c. 427–347 B.C.)