 Photo: Bertil Pettersson Kvistaberg Observatory |
Åke Wallenquist (1904-1994)Professor Wallenquist in front of the entrance to the Schmidt dome at the inauguration of the telescope in 1964.Wallenquist was a student of professor Bergstrand at the Uppsala Observatory. During the years 1928-1935 he was working at the Dutch Bosscha Observatory in Indonesia and was later, in 1948, appointed as director of the new Kvistaberg Observatory. He was originally working in the area of binary stars, but it was the open star clusters and their properties that became his main area of research. Wallenquist was a very active member of both the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and the Royal Society of Sciences in Uppsala. From the 1950's, and onwards, he was the leading writer of popular astronomy in Sweden among the professional astronomers. His books inspired generations of young people to become interested in astronomy. Asteroid 2114 Wallenquist was named in his honour.
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