Theodor von Schubert

Friedrich Theodor von Schubert (1758 to 1825) was a German astronomer and geographer who spent his working life in Russia. He was born in Helmstedt, the son of a theology professor and abbot, and studied theology before turning away from it. Working as a private tutor in the Baltic region he taught himself mathematics and astronomy, and in 1785 he became an assistant of the Russian Academy of Sciences as a geographer. He was a full member by June 1789 and in 1803 became head of the Academy's astronomical observatory. In 1805 he took part, with his son, in a Russian expedition to China that failed. He wrote Theoretische Astronomie in three volumes (1798), a history of astronomy (1804) and a three volume Populare Astronomie (1808 to 1810), and he helped spread astronomical knowledge through the St. Petersburger Kalender, which he published from 1788 to 1825. In 1812 he was elected a Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. His son Theodor Friedrich von Schubert, a Russian general and explorer, has a lunar crater named for him.