Nevertheless, Williamina went from being an innocent young maid to an astronomer. What led to this remarkable transformation?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Williamina Fleming was a Scottish astronomer born in Dundee on 15 May 1857 and died on 21 May 1911 after significantly impacting the world. <\/p>\n\n\n\n She worked as a local teacher in Dundee ( her homeland in Scotland), where she met her sweetheart and married. She married James Orr Fleming in 1877, a widower, and accountant, with an age difference of more than a decade.<\/p>\n\n\n\n At that time, Williamina had everything going on perfectly. However, life always has its unique way of surprise. Things took another form for Williamina Fleming. <\/p>\n\n\n\n At age twenty-one, Williamina and her husband, James Fleming, left everything behind and started a new life in Boston, Massachusetts. There, they had a son together named Edward Fleming. <\/p>\n\n\n\n However, a few years after her son was born, Williamina was abandoned and left to care for her young son alone. Unknowing to Willimina, the door that closed on her ended up being her blessing to countless opportunities in disguise. Like any woman in her case, she took on roles to support herself and her young son, Edward. <\/p>\n\n\n\n During her job searches, her road to success was opened when she met the famous physics professor, Edward Charles Pickering, <\/em>who employed Willamina as a maid to take care of his domestic activities. <\/p>\n\n\n\n However, as a brilliant physics professor, Pickering quickly observed his maid\u2019s capabilities and High IQ (Intelligent-Quotient).<\/p>\n\n\n\n In one of his conversations with his team of assistants, out of frustration, he burst out one of the most famous phrases \u201cEven my maid could do a better job\u201d. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Williamina\u2019s competence and hard work in taking care of household chores brought her the rare privilege of working as a part-time administrative worker at Harvard observatory college. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The other male assistants of Professor Pickering proved irresponsible and constantly caused him headaches. Hence, he was quick and moved to hire hardworking and competent Williamina to help out at the observatory college. <\/p>\n\n\n\n After seeing her tremendous impact in a short while, Pickering hired her as a full-time copyist and a clerical staff at the observatory. As a result, Wiliamina became a full-blown Harvard College Observatory (HCO) member. <\/p>\n\n\n\n While there, she demonstrated how good she could be in the scientific field by observing, identifying, and cataloging more than 10,000 stars, assigning a befitting classification used at that time. <\/p>\n\n\n\n She introduced a new accession model, assigning a letter from A to Q (except J) based on the relative amount of hydrogen present in the spectra of stars. This system was known as the Pickering-Fleming system. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The stars observed and detected to have hydrogen as the most abundant element was lettered A, while the second most abundant was lettered B, and so on. <\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.historydefined.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/1200px-Williamina_Paton_Stevens_Fleming_circa_1890s-791x1024.jpeg\"){kind=spacer}
Where it all started<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Impacts at Harvard Observatory College <\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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The Harvard Computers,<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n