 Ormond Stone
Ormond Stone was born January 11, 1847 in Pekin, Illinois, the son of
a Methodist minister, the Rev. Elijah and Sophia Creighton
Stone. While attending Chicago High School, he met Professor Truman
Henry Safford, an astronomer at the recently completed Dearborn
Observatory and Stone became his pupil, quickly beginning his
life-long interest in astronomy. In 1866 Stone enrolled at the University of Chicago, graduating
with a degree of M.A. in 1870. Working his way through school, he
served as an instructor in 1867-8 at Racine College in
Wisconsin, then at the Northwestern Female College (which is now a
part of Northwestern
University at Evanston, Illinois in 1869. Also that year, he
participated in what would be the first of three eclipse expeditions
in his lifetime. It was on this trip to Des Moines, Iowa with
Professor Safford that he met astronomers from the United States Naval
Observatory. He would end up being in charge of the later two
expeditions, the first in 1878, when he led the USNO expedition to
Colorado, and the May 28, 1900 eclipse, when he led the McCormick
Observatory expedition to Winesboro, South Carolina (Samuel Mitchell was in Griffin, Georgia
observing this same eclipse). Upon graduating from the University of
Chicago in 1870, he accepted an assistantship at the USNO where he
stayed until 1875. He was assigned to the Meridian Circle, under
William Harkness. His tenure there coincided with the arrival of the
26-inch Alvan Clark refractor at the Naval Observatory. This telescope
was essentially a twin to the future McCormick Refractor. In 1871, he
married Catherine Flagler of Washington, D.C.
In 1875, Stone accepted the directorship of the Cincinnati
Observatory, having received a recommendation from Simon
Newcomb. While there, he instituted a program of discovering new
southern double stars and was the first to establish standard time for
an American city, and he pushed for the adoption of Standard Time
Belts (or zones, as we now know them). In 1882, with Leander J. McCormick's approval, Stone was
offered the position of director at the brand new observatory being
built at the University of Virginia, and was accompanied from Cincinnati by John Jones and Frank P. Leavenworth. Stone oversaw the final stages of
construction on the Observatory, which was completed for use in 1885,
but began astronomical work almost immediately upon his arrival in
Charlottesville. Stone's work focused largely on observing nebulae,
southern variables and double stars. The Observatory's resources included the
67-cm refractor, a 3-inch Fauth transit, a 4-inch Kahler refractor, a
sidereal clock and a meantime chronometer.
As director, Stone's responsibilities included fundraising, which he
detested and did very poorly. Though the Observatory was always short
of funds, he used funds donated by William Vanderbilt to establish
three fellowships, $350 for a year, to pay for assistants at the
observatory. The list of Vanderbilt Fellows the worked under Stone was
an impressive one and included astronomers, university presidents,
professors and professionals in various fields. Stone had a
good-natured disposition and appreciated a joke at his expense,
including the gibes that accompanied his nickname at the Observatory,
"Twinkles".
Stone also had a reputation for being forgetful, as shown in this story
from Vanderbilt Fellow Charles P. Olivier:
"He was a sociable man and enjoyed the companionship of friends. He was
also quite forgetful, an absent-minded professor when his mind was on
his work. At the time he taught there, the university grounds ended at
Emmett Street, near a cemetery. Professor Stone would ride his horse
down to the campus and tie it up in the cemetery while he went to teach
his class. Sometimes he would get sidetracked for hours, completely
forgetting about the horse. The first time this happened, some very
frightened residents sent for the police and asked them to find out what
was causing the dreadful noises coming from the cemetery late in the
night. The police found the hose, alone and hungry, and after much
searching, they found a student who recognized the horse as belonging to
Professor Stone. The professor was finally found at home, sound asleep,
blissfully unaware of the turmoil he had caused. After that, whenever
the dreadful noises were heard in the cemetery a student would be
rounded up and sent to get the horse and take it home to Professor
Stone."
Stone remained at the McCormick Observatory until 1912. In his time
there, he taught various astronomy courses for the University, founded
the Annals of
Mathematics in 1884, funded the publication with his own money,
and edited the journal (with William M. Thornton, Chair of the Faculty
for the first volume) until 1899 (after which he served on the
editorial board), founded the Philosophical Society at UVA and spent
much of the final ten years of his directorship in the cause for
secondary education in Virginia. He was a member of the American Association for the Advancement of
Science (Member: 1875; Fellow: 1876; Chair, Committee on Standard
Time: 1880; Member of Committee on Stellar Magnitudes: 1880;
Vice-President, Astronomy and Mathematics: 1887; Vice-President of
Section A: Astrometry, of Department 11: Astronomy: 1888; Chair: 1901
Councilor, Section A, Mathematics and Astronomy: 1902-1905; Sectional
Committee, Section A: 1905-1907; Emeritus Life Member: 1927), the
American Astronomical and Astrophysical Society, now known as the American Astronomical Society (Councilor
1899-1909), and the American Mathematical
Society (Councilor 1897), among many other academic societies. He
served on the Board of Visitors (as Secretary) for the United States Naval Observatory
from 1901 to 1903, served on the first Advisory Committee on
Mathematics for the Carnegie Institution
of Washington starting in 1902, and was a trustee of Harrisonburg
Normal College (now James Madison
University. He also maintained contacts with people of influence
across the country, including his brother Melville Stone, the founder
of the Chicago Daily News, who became well known as the General
Manager of Associated Press.
He retired on a stipend from the Carnegie Foundation in 1912 to a
30-acre farm in Centreville, Virginia, with a two-story house set well
back from the road and surrounded by tall poplar trees. His wife died in
1914 and he later married Mary Florence Brennan of Lansing, Michigan. He
brought Mary back to Centreville along with her two sisters Grace and
Elizabeth. Stone attended a local, little stone Methodist church on
Braddock Road or Zion Church in Fairfax. He continued to be active in
the educational, religious and social problems of his local community
and the state. He was the first resident to cede land to the state for a
right-of-way to build a road crossing the farms between Lee Highway and
Braddock Road in Centreville, and so the road was named Stone Road (now also designated as Route 662.
He served as Vice President of the Virginia State Teachers'
Association, and was a leader in the movement to improve Virginia's
public school system. In 1991, a Ormond Stone Middle
School was opened in Fairfax County.
In November 1929, Professor Stone (as everyone referred to him) and his
friend, lawyer Thomas Keith approached the County Board of Supervisors
to request space to begin a library. The County provided no funds, but a
small space in an old office in the courthouse and it was the first step
in the eventual establishment of the Fairfax County Public Library
System. Stone spent much of his last years gathering and organizing
donated books for this small library. He was tragically killed just six
days after his eighty-sixth birthday when he was struck and instantly
killed by a C&P Telephone Company vehicle while he was walking along
the road near his farm. He was remembered by friends as a man of strong
character, a distinguished scientist, and a faithful Christian
gentleman. His funeral was held in the that little stone church on
Braddock Road, with many distinguished scientists and countless friends
and neighbors in attendance. He was buried in the cemetery at St.
John's Episcopal Church on Mt. Gilead Road.
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