Swift (February 29, 1820 – January 5, 1913[1]) was an American astronomer who discovered 13 comets and 1,248 previously uncatalogued nebulae.

According to Swift, he first became interested in astronomy as young boy after observing the Great Comet of 1843 while on his way to school in Clarkson, New York.

[4] Swift conducted his early observations in Rochester, NY, 'lain out in the snow' in an alley on Ambrose Street or on the roof of Duffy's Cider Mill.

Later he gained a patron in the Rochester patent medicine businessman Hulbert Harrington Warner, who financed the building of an observatory for Swift.

[5][4] Warner went bankrupt in the Panic of 1893, which ended his financial support, and Swift then went to California to become director of Mount Lowe Observatory, taking the 16 inch telescope with him.