[Ads-l] Antedating of "Redshift"

[ADSGarson O'Toole]

Interesting topic, Fred. Thanks for posting an intriguing lead for "redshift".
The situation is confusing. The current Wikipedia article on
"redshift" does not seem to have any mention of the 1908 Walter S.
Adams article.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redshift

The Wikipedia revision history does mention the article.
A snapshot of the Wikipedia article with timestamp "15:00, 16 March
2023" shows that the 1908 Walter S. Adams citation was labeled
"[dubious – discuss]".

A snapshot with timestamp "21:51, 17 March 2023‎" shows that the
Walter S. Adams citation was removed. The person who removed it said
"‎History: might as well just say what the OED says here".

Below is the passage that was removed:

[Begin excerpt Wikipedia Redshift article on March 16 2023]
The earliest occurrence of the term red-shift in print (in this
hyphenated form) appears to be by American astronomer Walter S. Adams
in 1908, in which he mentions "Two methods of investigating that
nature of the nebular red-shift".[8][dubious – discuss]
[End excerpt Wikipedia Redshift article on March 16 2023]

I followed the old Wikipedia link to the 1908 Walter S. Adams article
and downloaded the PDF.

https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1908CMWCI..22....1A/abstract
https://articles.adsabs.harvard.edu/pdf/1908CMWCI..22....1A

The PDF was not searchable, so I ran it through an OCR program. I
could not find "redshift" of "red shift". Also, I could not find
"nebular". The article does contain phrases such as: "Strengthened to
red" and "Widened to red".

OCR can be faulty. Maybe someone else can find "redshift" of "red
shift" in the article.

It is possible that the 1908 citation in Wikipedia was an error.
Alternatively, there is another 1908 article by Walter S. Adams with a
similar title.

Garson

On Sun, Jun 23, 2024 at 6:05 PM Shapiro, Fred <fred.shapiro at yale.edu> wrote:
>
> redshift (OED 1923)
>
> Wikipedia cites the following source for the term "redshift":
>
> Adams, Walter S., "No. 22. Preliminary catalogue of lines affected in sun-spots<http://adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-bib_query?bibcode=1908CMWCI..22....1A>" (1908) Contributions from the Mount Wilson Observatory / Carnegie Institution of Washington, vol. 22, pp.1–21
>
> Fred Shapiro
>
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org