A heliostat throws sunlight where it might be used for photography or scientific observations. This simple and inexpensive example was designed in the mid-1870s by Rueul Keith, a mathematician who worked for the U.S. Naval Observatory. It was made by Edward Kubel, a German mechanic who arrived in Washington, D.C., in 1849, and went to work making and mending instruments needed by such agencies as the U.S. Coast Survey, the U.S. Geological Survey, and the Army Medical Museum. It was made for Samuel Pierpont Langley, the third Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, and used in the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory. A tag reads: “EDWARD KUBEL / MATH. INST. MAKER / WASHINGTON, D.C.”
Ref: D. J. Warner, “Keith’s American Heliostat,” Rittenhouse 10 (1996): 58-64.
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