France 1949 – François Arago
Dominique François Jean Arago
(1786–1853) was a French physicist, astronomer and
statesman. Among his major achievements was to establish the
wave nature of light, in conjunction with Augustin Fresnel.
Arago also studied the polarization of light and is credited
with discovering the Sun’s chromosphere at the total
eclipse of 1842.
Arago was director of the Paris Observatory
from 1843-53 where he encouraged U.J.J. LeVerrier to study
irregularities in the motion of the planet Uranus, which led to
the prediction and subsequent discovery of Neptune. Arago also
worked on electromagnetism, which is presumably why he is shown
alongside André Ampère on this stamp, part of a
set of four marking the 1949 International Telephone and
Telegraph Congress in Paris.
Although the Gibbons catalogue describes
its colour as Violet, this stamp is printed in black. (Was the
catalogue compiler working under strange lighting conditions?)
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