First Photograph Of The Moon
Once again, nobody get in the way of John William Draper and his determination to make history. Not only was he the first to photograph a woman with her eyes open, but he is the first to successfully photograph the moon in 1840. Did we mention that Draper was also a professor at NYU? Not only that, but Draper’s portfolio was full of amazing feats. Given his interest in medicine, chemistry, and evolution, it is surprising that Draper is best known today for a book on quite a different subject, published in 1874. It was called A History of the Conflict between Religion and Science, where he tried to make the case that, throughout history, science has tried to expand our horizons and the church has tried to confine them, that science and religion have always been at war.
Additionally, Draper was a co-discoverer of the first basic law of photochemistry called the Grotthuss-Draper Law. It says that light must be absorbed by a system to bring about photochemical change. He also gave us the so-called Draper point. He realized that any object, regardless of material, glows dull red at 977oF. That was important in the evolution of quantum mechanics. Of course, pictured above is another one of his great feats: the first image of the moon. Daguerreotypes do not have a long shelf life unless they are carefully preserved from the moment they are taken, so the lunar image has suffered in the last 180 years, but it is still there, a significant astrophotographic first.
