Gedeonov, Dmitrh Danilovich

Born Nov. 7 (19), 1854, in Venev, now in Tula Oblast; died Sept. 11 (24), 1908, in Tashkent. Russian geodesist and astronomer.

Gedeonov graduated from the geodetic division of the Academy of the General Staff in 1881 and became assistant director of the geodetic division in 1887. From 1890 to 1900 he was the director of the Tashkent Observatory. In 1900 he became the director of the Turkestan Military Topographical Division. Gedeonov worked out a new method of precise leveling (1884). He made numerous observations to study changes in the latitude of Tashkent. During his work on determining the adjustment of clocks based on observations of stars (Gedeonov’s method), he demonstrated the advantages of his method over the method of determining time based on observations of stars along the vertical of the North Star.