OBSERVATORIO ASTRONOMICO DE CÓRDOBA - OBSERVATOIRE DE CÓRDOBA

The Argentine National Observatory was founded in Córdoba in 1871, on the initiative of President Domingo Faustino Sarmiento (1811-1888) and thanks to the efforts of his minister, Nicolás Avellaneda. Its first director was the American astronomer Benjamin A. Gould. From the construction of the first building located in "Los Altos" - nowadays called "Barrio Observatorio" - astronomers devoted themselves to determining the position and brightness of all the stars visible to the naked eye, making it one of the most accurate atlases of the time, the Uranometria Argentina. If this atlas is essentially the result of visual observations (more than a million observations are necessary!), at the same time astronomers use the large 28 cm diameter equatorial telescope to photograph the celestial vault and thus carry out the largest scientific photographic research work ever carried out in the 19th century (finally published in 1896). At the same time, the observatory is also becoming a strategic institution in other fields of science with the creation of the National Meteorological Office (to assist in the development of sectors related to agriculture and livestock), the first accurate determinations of the geographical longitudes of the country's most important cities (to produce accurate maps for trade and transport), and measurements of the Earth's magnetic field. The observatory is also responsible for defining and broadcasting - by telegraph - the official time for the whole territory. At the beginning of the 20th century, the observatory was modernised and oriented towards astrophysics.... Extensive studies are carried out on nebulous objects in the southern sky (nebulae and galaxies), there is a temptation to verify certain phenomena related to the theory of relativity, and a series of observations of the famous Halley's comet is even launched. It was at this time that the construction of the large 76 cm diameter telescope and a giant 1.5 m diameter mirror telescope began, placing the institution at the forefront of international astronomical research centres. Today, in addition to the access to the domes, a beautiful museum is to be discovered, as well as prestigious instruments... The 28 cm (286 mm) equatorial telescope, dating from 1890, therefore specialized in photographic photography, which is now located under the northeast dome, or the exceptional astrograph telescope (photographic telescope) designed by the Prosper brothers and Paul Henry of the Paris Observatory (for optics) and by the French mechanic P. Gautier (for its mechanical parts).