Otto Hermann Leopold Heckmann

Otto Hermann Leopold Heckmann

1964

Date of Birth
: 
June 23, 1901
Date of Death
: 
May 13, 1983

Otto Heckmann was educated at the University of Bonn, worked at the University of Göttingen from 1927 to 1941, and directed the Hamburg Observatory from 1941 to 1962. He determined positions and proper motions of the faint members of the Praesepe cluster and worked on the structure and dynamics of several clusters. He made major contributions toward producing the second Astronomische Gesellschaft Katalog (AGK) to show proper motions of 180,000 stars, and he organized the international effort to produce the third. He and other observatory directors then established observatories in the southern hemisphere to produce a similar catalog for the southern skies. At Hamburg he helped design and oversaw the installation of a 1.2-m Schmidt telescope. Equally adept at observation and theory, Heckmann made significant contributions to cosmology: he found open and flat solutions to the Einstein field equations for a homogeneous, isotropic universe, and he introduced the possibility of a rotating universe. His book on cosmology rigorously developed the consequences of general relativity. After World War II Heckmann joined with other leaders in European astronomy to promote the idea of a joint observatory in the southern hemisphere, and from 1962 to 1969 he served as the first director general of the European Southern Observatory.

Presentation of Bruce medal

Petrie, R.M., PASP 76, 135 (1964).

Other awards

Association pour le Développement International del’Observatoire de Nice, ADION medal, 1966
National Academy of Sciences, James Craig Watson Medal, 1961.
Paris Academy of Sciences, Janssen Medal, 1964.

Some offices held

Astronomische Gesellschaft, President, 1952-56.
International Astronomical Union, President, 1967-70.

Biographical materials

Hentschel, Klaus & Monika Renneberg: “Eine akademische Karriere. Der Astronom Otto Heckmann im Dritten Reich,” Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte 43, 581-610 (1995).

Obituaries

Behr, A., ESO Messenger No. 33, p. 1 (1983).
Fehrenbach, C., Compte Rendue Acad. Sci., Sér. Gén, Vie Scie. 1, 6, 591-93 (1984) [in French].
Fricke, W., QJRAS 25, 374-76 (1984).
Treder, H.J., Astron. Nachr. 305, 150 (1984) [in German].
Voigt, H.H., Mitteilungen der Astronomischen Gesellschaft 60, 9-12 (1983) [in German].

Portraits

History of Hamburg Observatory

Named after him

Minor Planet #1650 Heckmann

Bibliography

Papers, etc.

Some papers are at the ESO Historical Archives.

Other References: Historical

Anderson, Stuart R. & Dieter Engels, “A Short History of Hamburg Observatory” (2004)
http://www.hs.uni-hamburg.de/EN/Oef/Stw/anderson/History.htm

Blaauw, Adrian, ESO’s Early History (ESO, Garching bei München, 1991).

Cesarsky, Catherine & Claus Madsen, “Focussing European Astronomy — ESO’s Role in The ‘Comeback’ Of European Astronomy,” in A. Heck, ed., Organizations and Strategies in Astronomy, vol. 7 (Springer, 2006), pp. 97-113.

Ehlers, Anita, Liebes Hertz! Physiker und Mathematiker in Anekdoten (Birkhaeuser Verlag, Basel, Boston, Berlin, 1994).

Hentschel, K. & M.Renneberg: “Ausschaltung” oder “Verteidigung” der allgemeinen Relativitaetstheorie - Interpretation einer Kosmologen-Karriere im Nationalsozialismus [“Shut-down” or “Defense” of the general theory of relativity - Interpretation of a cosmological career in National-Socialism; about Otto Heckmann], in Meinel, Christoph & Peter Voswinckel, (Eds.): Medizin, Naturwissenschaft, Technik und Nationalsozialismus: Kontinuitaeten und Diskontinuitaeten [Medicine, Science, Technology and National Socialism: Continuities and Discontinuities] (Verlag für Geschichte der Naturwissenschaften und der Technik, Stuttgart, 1994), pp. 201-08.

Heckmann, O., “The Present State of the Project for a European Observatory in South Africa,” Monthly Notes of the Astron. Soc. Southern Africa 20, 44 (1961).

Heckmann, O., “Concluding Remarks,” in David Livingstone Crawford, ed., The Construction of Large Telescopes, Proceedings from IAU Symposium no. 27 held in Tucson, Arizona, Pasadena and Mount Hamilton, California, U.S.A., 5-12 April 1965 (Academic Press, London, 1966), pp. 225-28.

Irwin, John, “The Case of the Southern Skies,” Griffith Observer 56, 7, 2 (July 1992).

Kuiper, G.P., “German Astronomy During the War,” Popular Astronomy 54, 263-87 (1946).

Schramm, K. Jochen, Sterne über Hamburg: die Geschichte der Astronomie in Hamburg (Kultur- und Geschichtskontor, Hamburg, 1996)
http://www.friedensblitz.de/sterne/Index.html

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Other References: Scientific

Heckmann, Otto, “Photographische Vermessung der Praesepe,” Astr. Nach. 225, 49/50-69/70 (1925).

Heckmann, O. & H. Siedentopf, “Über die Struktur der kugelförmigen Sternhaufen,” Zeitschrift für Physik 54, 518-33 (1929).

Heckmann, Otto, “Über die Metrik des sich ausdehnenden Universums,” Veroeffentlichungen der Universitaets-Sternwarte zu Goettingen 2, 126.1-131 (1931).

Heckmann, O. & H. Strasl, “Zur Dynamik des Sternsystems,” Veroeffentlichungen der Universitaets-Sternwarte zu Goettingen 3, 191-206 (1933).

Heckmann, O. & H. Kienle, “Photographische Photometrie nach der Halbfiltermethode,” Veroeffentlichungen der Universitaets-Sternwarte zu Goettingen 4, 17-29 (1937).

Heckmann, O., “Zur Kosmologie,” Veroeffentlichungen der Universitaets-Sternwarte zu Goettingen 4, 291-303 (1940).

Heckmann, O., “Geodätische Linien und Newtonsche Bewegungsgleichungen,” Veroeffentlichungen der Universitaets-Sternwarte zu Goettingen 4, 363-68 (1941).

Heckmann, Otto, Theorien der Kosmologie (Springer, Berlin, et al, 1942, 1968).

Heckmann, O., “Skizze eines neuen Spektroheliographen,” Zeitschrift für Astrophysik 23, 19-23 (1944).

Heckmann, O. & W. Kruse, “Eigenbewegung von 829 Sternen in der Umgebung der Praesepe,” Mitteilungen der Hamburger Sternwarte in Bergedorf 8, 145-55 (1949).

Heckmann, O., P. Jordan, & W. Fricke, “Zur erweiterten Gravitations theorie. I,” Zeitschrift für Astrophysik 28, 113-49 (1951).

Heckmann, O., “Theorie und Erfahrung in der Kosmologie,” Die Naturwissenschaften 38, 84-91 (1951).

Heckmann, O., “The Value of a Third AG Catalogue,” Astronomical Journal 59, 31-34 (1954).

Heckmann, Otto, & H.L. Johnson “A New Color-Magnitude Diagram for the Hyades Cluster,” Ap.J. 124, 477-79 (1956).

Heckmann, O., “Photographic Photometry of the Hyades,” Vistas in Astronomy 2, 1115-22 (1956).

Heckmann, O. & W. Dieckvoss, “Questions of Method and Technique Concerning Proper Motions,” Astronomical Journal 63, 156-66 (1958).

Heckmann, O., “The Aberration of Extragalactic Nebulae,” Annales d’Astrophysique 23, 410-15 (1960).

Heckmann, O., “Der gegenwärtige Stand des Dritten AG-Katalogs (AGK3),” Astr. Nach. 286, 35-38 (1960).

Heckmann, Otto, “On the Possible Influence of a General Rotation on the Expansion of the Universe,” Astronomical Journal 66, 599-603 (1961).

Heckmann, Otto, “Newtonian and Relativistic Cosmology,” Observatory 79, 130-31 (1962).

Heckmann, Otto, “General Review of Cosmological Theories,” IAU Symposium 15, 429-40 (1962).

Heckmann, Otto, Moderne Kosmologie (Angelsachsen-Verlag, Bremen, 1970).

Heckmann, Otto, Copernicus und die moderne Astronomie (Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina, Hall/Saale, 1973).

Dieckvoss, W. , ed., AGK3: Star Catalogues of Positions and Proper Motions North of –2.5 deg. Declination planned by O. Heckmann; produced and edited by W. Dieckvoss, in collaboration with H. Kox, A. Günther, E. Brosterhus. (Sternwarte, Hamburg-Bergedorf, 1975) [abstract; online data].

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Other Works: Popularizations, History, etc.

Heckmann, O., “Die Astronomie in der Geistesgeschichte der Neuzeit,” Die Naturwissenschaften 44, 6, 125-32 (1957).

Heckmann, Otto, Sterne, Kosmos, Weltmodelle: Erlebte Astronomie (R. Piper, München, 1976).