Charles Messier was a noted French astronomer, who discovered the nebulae and star clusters. Beginning his career as a draftsman with a well-known Navy astronomer in Paris, he soon became a keen observer on his own. Eventually he started observing the sky from his master’s observatory, located at the top of the Hôtel de Cluny in the downtown Paris with a 100 mm refracting telescope. Thus he was able to observe the sky from the north celestial pole to a declination of about −35.7° and record all objects in that specific area. Although he had discovered many comets, he is best remembered for publishing a list of nebulae and star clusters. However, not all objects on the ‘Messier’s List’ had been discovered by him; some had been previously observed by others. Messier had compiled all of them in the list so that comet hunters could differentiate between the permanent and transient objects in the sky. The objects on the list, designated from M1 to M110, are still being used by astronomers as important references.
