hen Carleton began publishing its
scientific periodical, the College's astronomy program was already
well-established and well-known for an even more popular and
pragmatic venture. The director of the observatory was fast on his
way to creating one of the two largest and best-regulated
time-services in the United States. One may truly say of astronomy
at Carleton that "time" was of the essence.
Accurate timekeeping
was and is essential for astronomical work, and it was also the one
product of an observatory which had immediate practical
application. Nine- teenth-century railroads vied with each other to
keep to their published schedules and needed precise timing to
properly switch tracks and avoid collisions. Each railroad used its
"own" time, usually derived from an observatory in its
headquarters' city and telegraphed to each station along the line.
In the 1870s, there was no major observatory northwest of
Cincinnati, and the new Carleton time-service rushed in to fill the
gap. In 1878 it sent out the first time-signals west of the
Mississippi to several railroads centered in the Twin Cities and in
Chicago.
By 1888, the Carleton time-service set time for over 12,000
miles of railroad, from Illinois and Wisconsin to Oregon and
Manitoba. Clients included the Northern Pacific, the Great
Northern, the Chicago, Milwaukee, and St. Paul, and the St. Paul,
Minneapolis, and Manitoba railroads. In 1883, the observatory also
began a time-ball service in St. Paul, whereby a sphere was dropped
down a pole atop the Fire and Marine building at noon every day, in
order that all in the city could set their watches and clocks. (The
famous ceremony in Times Square every New Year is a vestige of a
similar service in New York.) Time was provided, too, directly to
many of the jewelers and banks in the Cities. Carleton, a small and
otherwise as yet undistinguished college on the Minnesota plains,
had become the timekeeper for the entire Northwest.
