About Johann Friedrich Julius Schmidt
Johann Friedrich Julius Schmidt (25 October 1825 in Eutin, Grand Duchy of Oldenburg – 7 February 1884 in Athens, Greece) was a German astronomer and geophysicist. He was the director of the National Observatory of Athens in Greece from 1858 to 1884. Julius Schmidt was tireless in his work, it was suggested by William Henry Pickering that he perhaps devoted more of his life than any other man to the study of the Moon. During his lifetime, he made some of the most complete lunar maps of the 19th century. According to his own analysis, he mapped no less than 32,856 craters, with Mädler mapping 7,735 and Lohrmann 7,177. Schmidt also mapped 348 lunar rilles. In six years, he made almost 57,000 micrometer settings to make 3050 height measurements of the terrain. In July 1841, the Hamburg Gymnasium made a visit to the Altona Observatory, where Schmidt looked through a larger telescope for the first time and became acquainted with the well-known map of the Moon made by Wilhelm Beer and Johann Heinrich Mädler.
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