created: 04-07-2014.       revised: 06-03-2014.

American astronomer Harlow Shapely, (1885 - 1972), born in the small town of Nashville Missouri, studied astronomy at the University of Missouri, and earned his PH.D from Princeton University.
One of the lesser known catalogs of open star clusters is the Harvard catalogue of 21 open clusters. It was compiled in 1930 by Shapely, who's many accomplishments include correctly estimating the size of the Milky-Way Galaxy and the sun's position within it.



While most of the 'Harvard' objects are already listed under other catalog designations such as 'Trumpler', or 'NGC', about half are unique objects, not listed in any other prior catalog.
These clusters are generally faint and sparse, and are sporadically listed in star charts & observing guides. A number of faint clusters can be found in Scoprius, but an interesting one, H20, can be found in the Sagitta.


Harvard-21



On the left side of the webpage is my personal observation list of the
'Harvard catalog of star clusters'.

I currently have all 11 of a possible 11 objects visible from my Pittsburgh, PA latitude of around +40.
(9 of the 'Harvard' objects are not observable from latitude +40. Also, Harvard-3 has gone missing).


Hope you enjoyed the visit. Come again soon!
Larry McHenry,   Pittsburgh, PA. USA

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