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FatherFrancis J. Heyden (May 3, 1907 inBuffalo, New York – February 8, 1991 inManila, Philippines), was an AmericanJesuit priest andastronomer. He served as Director of theGeorgetown University Observatory from 1950 to 1972. After the Georgetown Observatory was closed he moved to theManila Observatory.
He was born in Buffalo, New York in 1907.[1] His father was a pharmacist who died early as a result of a baseball injury. His mother left with him had his older a brother as teenagers. He graduated fromCanisius High School in Buffalo. he attendedWoodstock College inMaryland where he earned a A.B. degree in 1930, and a Master's in 1931.[2]
He entered the Society of Jesus in 1924 directly after graduating from Canisius.
After graduation from Woodstock College, he accepted an appointment at the Astronomical Division of the Manila Observatory in the Philippines where he served until 1934.He then returned to Woodstock and completed his theological studies and was ordained as a Jesuit priest in 1938.
He enteredHarvard University to complete a master's in Astronomy in 1942, and completed a Ph.D. in 1944. He was also a teaching fellow during that time, and did post-doctoral research withCecilia Payne-Gaposchkin andBart Bok.
Heyden had planned to return to Manila but the war made this impossible. He took a post at Georgetown University in Washington D.C. as an assistant professor in 1945 under the director Fr.Paul A. McNally. He was appointed to be the observatories director in 1948. He undertook seven expeditions to photograph and investigate solar eclipses in Brazil, Chain, Iran, the Sudan and the US.
He was a Ph.D. supervisor toJohn P. Hagen and was director whileVera Rubin studied there.
The directors of Georgetown closed the observatory in 1972, and he returned to Manila to continue work in solar spectroscopy. It was there that he died and was buried.[1]
