On Nov. 5, 1906, Fred Lawrence Whipple was born in the commercial trading town of Red Oak, Iowa. His more than 70 years of astronomical observations and scientific work changed our understanding of comets and made space travel safer. Read more
Fred Lawrence Whipple (November 5, 1906 - August 30, 2004) was an American astronomer, who worked at the Harvard College Observatory for over 70 years. Amongst his achievements, he discovered some asteroids and comets, came up with the "dirty snowball" cometary hypothesis, and designed the Whipple shield. Read more