American Philosophical Society
Member History

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1Name:  Jeremiah Dixon
 Year Elected:  
 Residency:  International
 Living? :   Deceased
 Birth Date:  7/27/1733
 Death Date:  1/22/1779
   
 
Jeremiah Dixon (27 July 1733–22 January 1779) was a surveyor and astronomer, best known for establishing the Pennsylvania-Maryland boundary (the Mason-Dixon Line), as well as a member of the American Society, elected in 1768. Born into a Quaker family in County Durham, England, he was educated at a local school. Early friendships with the instrument-maker John Bird and the mathematician William Emerson encouraged Dixon’s interest in those areas, and he soon became a surveyor. In 1760 he was chosen to assist Charles Mason in observing the 1761 Transit of Venus in Sumatra. When an attack on their ship by a French frigate delayed their arrival, they chose to conduct their observations from the Cape of Good Hope instead. They returned to England later that year after visiting the south Atlantic island of Saint Helena to assist future Astronomer Royal and APS member Nevil Maskelyne. In 1763 Dixon and Mason were engaged by the proprietors of Maryland and Pennsylvania to settle the long disputed boundary between the two colonies. The work of surveying the line and overseeing the physical demarcation thereof brought them nearly 250 miles west of Philadelphia and created what became the boundary between northern and southern U.S. states. After completing the line in 1766, Dixon and Mason measured a degree of latitude in Maryland and conducted some of the first American experiments with gravity at the Royal Society’s request. They returned to England in 1768 after being elected to the American Society. The following year Dixon observed a second Transit of Venus on his own in Norway. He then returned to Durham where he continued his surveying, producing maps of Auckland Castle and Lanchester Common. (PI, ANB, DNB)
 
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