One of her brothers, David Low, in early days a prominent judge in Kansas, served in Congress one term, but did not seek re-election because he found "politics and ideal honesty incompatible."

... as one calamity followed another in Kansas and family needs were met first.

Byrd's associations at Harvard were important elements in her development as an astronomer, and she particularly valued the mentoring she received from E C Pickering, who was well known for his conviction that women should receive support and recognition in the scientific world.

During the years that my life has been well nigh lived in an observatory, I have felt that some things are viewed differently by those without and those within the walls. One does not willingly try to dispel pleasant illusions, and yet, since an observatory with all its domes and piers, appliances and instruments, is designed for the search of truth, standing so near its cornerstone, I ask your leave to speak the truth frankly for a few minutes.

... it is not to found a palace for dreams, a place where the fancy may feast on swift-changing star pictures, that the walls of an observatory go up. It is to establish a place where truth is sought. I know that there are those who think that an observatory is a monument to human pride and human intellect, and the truth found here appears cold and visionary, without power to warm the human heart or make the world better. To me it seems that God made human minds hungry for all truth and that he says to the observer here, as well as to the disciple of old - "Seek, and ye shall find."

The Smith Observatory had an 11-inch equatorial telescope and a small meridian circle, but no regular income for maintenance and for purchase of books until an endowment was given by Elizabeth Haven in 1898. The equatorial lacked electric lighting for the micrometer (an instrument attached to the telescope eyepiece for measuring the angular distance between two objects such as a comet and a star) until students raised money for it by voluntary contributions in 1891-92.

It is, I understand, contrary to the traditions of this institution to give any woman the title and pay of professor.

Except in bitter midwinter weather this year, there have not been more than three or four nights a term when I could handle a telescope for any purpose save to adjust for students until after ten o'clock at night; and my work begins in the morning at eight or half past eight. May I beg you to consider how short, under such circumstances, must inevitably be the time during which a teacher can keep fresh springs of inspiration for her students. I have put off the evil day by working late at night, on very cold nights, and by spending since last Commencement, seven weeks of vacation time at the observatory.

The following description of the observations made in 1888 for determining the difference of longitude between the observatories of Smith College and Harvard College comprises three parts. Part I, by Mary E Byrd, gives an account of the instruments and of the telegraphic arrangements at Northampton, and includes the observations made by the writer at both stations. Part II, by Mary W Whitney, contains a description of the Cambridge instruments and of all her observations. Part III, which has been jointly prepared by both authors, discusses the clock-rates, the exchange of signals, the personal equation of the observers, and the result obtained for the required difference of longitude.

The truth is that we work so hard here to carry on a little independent work, living, I might almost say, for the sake of comets that come within the reach of our glass until observations and reductions are completed, that this attitude on the part of the 'Journal' is no small disappointment.

After a most successful directorship of the Smith College Observatory, at Northampton, Massachusetts, lasting nineteen years, Miss Byrd has voluntarily severed her connection, because of the acceptance by the Smith College authorities of money from Rockefeller and Carnegie.

Miss Byrd's devotion to principle and those principles the high old Puritan ones, is what might be expected from her ancestry and early environment, for her father's was the church known as "the abolition" one in Kansas' antislavery days and many were the persecutions suffered.

With this background in her life it is easy to see that for conscience sake she would yield the position she has long held with honour, and upon which she was dependent for support, and whether accepting her logic or not, no one not hardened by the commercialism of today can fail to respect her fidelity to principles and to admire her courage.

It is almost 40 years to the month since I met my first class in astronomy, at Wabash High School, Indiana. Never was the outlook darker in all that time for practical elementary astronomy. Ah, I have worked hard, given up so much to do my best to bring in better ways of teaching, and now the conviction comes home that I have failed. I should like to write just one more article, a scathing review of the unutterable indifference of astronomers, most of them, to the teaching of the elements of their science. I could do it too, I could say things in a way to make even the astronomers in the big observatories 'sit up and take notice' but I don't suppose I shall. It would mean hard work and probably would not do much good. Then too I am too kind-hearted really to enjoy more than the first few sentences.