Norman Lockyer

Born on 17 May 1836 in Rugby, England, Joseph Norman Lockyer was an astronomer who identified a new element in the solar atmosphere that he called helium. Lockyer served as a clerk in the British War Office, but his true passion was astronomy. At his house in Wimbledon he installed a 6-1/4-inch telescope. In 1865 he began observing sunspots with a spectroscope, which divided light into its component parts and allowed Lockyer to probe the Sun’s composition. In 1868 Lockyer discovered a layer of the Sun’s atmosphere that he called the chromosphere. That same year his solar spectroscopy measurements indicated the presence of a previously unknown element, which he named helium after Helios, the Greek god of the Sun. Lockyer shared credit for the discovery with French astronomer Jules Janssen. Helium, the second most abundant element in the universe behind hydrogen, wouldn’t be isolated on Earth until 1895. In 1869 Lockyer founded the scientific journal Nature.

Date in History: 17 May 1836