Elizabeth Beckley


Elizabeth Beckley was a pioneering British astronomical photographer.
She was the daughter of Robert Beckley, a mechanical engineer based at Kew Observatory, who developed the Robinson-Beckley anemometer with Thomas Romney Robinson.
Beckley worked at Kew Observatory, where she was one of the first women to work at an astronomical observatory.
Beckley photographed the sun in the 1860s and 1970s using a photoheliograph.
Beckley married fellow Kew Observatory employee George Matthew Whipple. They had two sons, and the eldest, Robert Whipple, was a scientific instrument collector, and founded the Whipple Museum of the History of Science in Cambridge.