David Weintraub’s review (Physics Today, April 2020, page 46) of Donovan Moore’s What Stars Are Made Of: The Life of Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin brought back several memories. When I was a freshman at Harvard University in September 1959, Payne-Gaposchkin was “chairman” of the astronomy department. Chain-smoking in her office, speaking with an English accent, and becoming as tall as I—six feet—when we stood up, she was intimidating. Only years later did I learn that she was the only woman regularly appointed to tenure on the Harvard faculty at the time.
Donald Menzel reported that when he became director of the Harvard College Observatory in 1956 and discovered “Mrs. G.’s” status and salary, he quickly improved both, pushing through her professorship with suitable compensation.
