E. Dorrit Hoffleit, Ph.D.

Jascin N. Leonardo Finger • September 8, 2025

Dorrit Hoffleit began her tenure at the MMO in 1957. A graduate of Radcliffe, Hoffleit earned a Ph.D. from Radcliffe in 1938. During World War Two, she worked for the U. S. government on missile trajectories and joined Yale’s Astronomy Department in 1956. Her directorship of the MMO allowed her to work part of the year on island and the remainder at Yale with the two organizations sharing her salary. She was the principal author of the Yale Bright Star Catalog – work that was continually added to over fifty years – and her work also focused on the study of variable stars. Hoffleit continued in the path of Harwood with research and public outreach, and bringing worldwide recognition to the MMO. Among her many accomplishments on behalf of the MMO, Hoffleit is known for her work with the National Science Foundation (NSF) and a grant she received in 1957 to allow for the summer training of female undergraduate students in astronomy. This was the pilot project for the national program of the Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) in various branches of science and technology, launched by the NSF in 1990. The MMA became a permanent REU site in astronomy, which is funded by the NSF based on periodically submitted proposals. Today, the MMO continues to have a lasting effect on its students. More than five percent of all the U.S. women becoming Ph.D.s in astronomy have participated in the MMA REU program. The probability of a current MMA REU student (either female or male) to become a Ph.D. is approximately sixty percent. Approximately fifty current professors of astronomy in the U. S. have participated in the REU program at the MMA. Hoffleit who retired from the MMO in 1978, continued her connections to the MMA up until the last weeks of her life. She passed away in 2007 at the age of one hundred.


JNLF

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