Neptune's Needle

Scientist, educator and government scientist, Bache was born in Philadelphia in 1806, into a prominent Pennyslvania family; his great-grandfather was Benjamin Franklin and his grandfather was jefferson's Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander James Dallas. He went to the Military Academy at West Point, from which he graduated in 1825 at the top of his class. His military service of three years consisted of teaching at West Point and serving in the Corps of Engineers. In 1828 he became a professor of natural philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania, where he began his lifelong efforts to forge a potent scientific community in the United States.

In 1836 he was named the first president of Girard College, but when the college failed to open in 1838 he took up a teaching position at the Central High School in Philadelphia before returning to Penn. In 1843, even before Hassler died, Bache mounted a campaign among his scientific friends to secure him appointment as Hassler's successor at the Coastal Survey. His Democratic connections helped him secure his appointment in the face of stiff competition from Survey insiders and military officers. During his two decades as director, Bache transformed the Survey into the most important scientific institution in the United States. He and his friend, the physicist Joseph henry, as head of the Smithsonian Institution, as organizers of the "Lazzaroni," an informal mutual admiration society among government and academically employed scientists, became the de facto leaders of American science, not least by hiring academics to help with Survey projects, thereby advancing their careers.

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Peter Richards