John Goldingham

John Goldingham FRS (1767 - July 1849) was the first official astronomer of the Madras Observatory, appointed in 1802.

Goldingham was also an architect and surveyor who headed the Madras Survey School which later grew into the Guindy Engineering College and then Anna University.

Born in London in 1767, Goldingham was first in the service of William Petrie at his private observatory and then hired by astronomer-sailor Michael Topping as his assistant in 1788.

Goldingham was put in charge of building an observatory in 1792, and later appointed as the Presidency Civil Engineer in 1800.

He then returned to his work as Government Astronomer, in the course of which he published two volumes of observations: one of them contains his observations on the length of the pendulum, the velocity of sound, of meteorological phenomena, as well as determinations of the longitude of Madras, and a discussion of the longitudes of the three Presidencies.