Discoveries, Achievements, and Personalities of the Women Who Evolved the Harvard Classification of Stellar Spectra: Williamina Fleming, Antonia Maury, and Annie Jump Cannon.

In 1915, the year in which Cannon (1863-1941) completed her work of classifying stars for The Henry Draper Catalogue, she published a popular article entitled, "Pioneering in the Classification of Stellar Spectra.” In it she gave a historical overview of the field in nineteenth-century Europe. She also detailed the context for the structured and routine work she and her colleagues had been engaged in for several years in America. The motivators that kept Cannon and the other women working diligently were the exciting prospect of making new discoveries, the reward of publicity, and their own personal pride. Usually, the discoveries consisted of finding a peculiar type of spectrum and identifying the star as a nova or variable. Such a discovery often resulted in a newspaper headline about the star and a story about the discoverer. This paper will outline the contributions each woman made to the classification system, her style of working, the papers she wrote and published, and the rewards she reaped for her dedication to the field.