William Herschel Maps the Milky Way Galaxy

In 1785, German-British astronomer William Herschel, with assistance from his sister Caroline, published the first map of the Milky Way galaxy based on his systematic 'star-gauging' method. By counting stars visible in different directions through his telescope and assuming uniform star distribution, Herschel produced a flattened disc-shaped model of the galaxy with the Solar System near its center. Though his conclusion about our position was incorrect due to his unawareness of interstellar dust obscuring distant stars, Herschel's work represented the first scientific attempt to determine the structure of our galaxy and established the Milky Way as a flattened disc system.