Stanislaus Vasilevskis papers, 1943-1989

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Summary

Creators:
Vasilevskis, Stanislaus
Extent:
6.3 Linear Feet 7 boxes
Language:
English
Preferred citation:

Stanislaus Vasilevskis papers. MS 255. Special Collections and Archives, University Library, University of California, Santa Cruz.

Background

Scope and content:

This collection documents the career of Lick Observatory astronomer Stanislaus Vasilevskis, and includes his professional correspondence, International Astronomical Union documentation, notes and reports from various astronomical and astrometric conferences, subject files, materials on various research programs at Lick Observatory, lectures and teaching notes, and other research materials.

Biographical / historical:

Stanislaus Vasilevskis was an astronomer and astrometrist born in 1907 in Latvia. He earned his Ph.D. at the University of Riga in 1939, and migrated to the United States, where he began working at the Lick Observatory as an assistant astronomer in 1945. Under the directorship of C.D. Shane, he worked on the observatory’s proper-motion study, which was launched in 1947. In 1954, Vasilevskis was promoted to assistant astronomer and faculty member at Lick Observatory, and also began supervising the proper-motion study. As part of this project, Vasilevskis was involved in taking multiple series of thousands of photographs of the northern sky, and thereby measured the movements of more than 300,000 stars in the Milky Way galaxy. Vasilevskis was promoted to full Professor of Astronomy and Astrophysics in 1966, the same year that the Lick Observatory moved its operations and administration to UC Santa Cruz. He retired from the University of California in 1974, and then served as a visiting professor at the University of Leiden in the Netherlands for a few years. Vasilevskis died in 1988 at the age of 80 in Palo Alto, California.

Processing information:

Most folder titles are derived from the original folder labels.

Arrangement:

This collection is organized into eight series:

  • 1. Correspondence
  • 2. International Astronomical Union (IAU)
  • 3. Research
  • 4. Teaching and lectures
  • 5. Conferences
  • 6. Lick Observatory
  • 7. Kitt Peak Observatory
  • 8. Biography and bibliography

Materials within each series are arranged in chronological order, unless otherwise specified.

Rules or conventions:
Describing Archives: A Content Standard

Access and use

Restrictions:

Collection is open for research.

Terms of access:

Property rights for this collection reside with the University of California. Literary rights, including copyright, are retained by the creators and their heirs. The publication or use of any work protected by copyright beyond that allowed by fair use for research or educational purposes requires written permission from the copyright owner. Responsibility for obtaining permissions, and for any use rests exclusively with the user. For more information on copyright or to order a reproduction, please visit guides.library.ucsc.edu/speccoll/reproduction-publication.

Preferred citation:

Stanislaus Vasilevskis papers. MS 255. Special Collections and Archives, University Library, University of California, Santa Cruz.

Location of this collection:
Special Collections and Archives, University Library
1156 High Street
Santa Cruz, CA 95064, US
Contact:
(831) 459-2547
speccoll@library.ucsc.edu
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