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Andrew Ellicott, the American surveyor appointed by President Washington to survey the boundary lines of the federal Territory of Columbia, which later became the District of Columbia, and credited with teaching surveying and astronomy to American explorer Meriwether Lewis, also has a place in Florida history.
On Nov. 12, 1799, Ellicott witnessed the Leonids meteor shower from a ship off the Keys, which made the astronomical phenomenon North America’s first meteor shower on record.
Unfortunately, this achievement is often incorrectly credited to Andrew Ellicott Douglass – a fellow American astronomer who wouldn’t be born for another 68 years.
– McKinley Lewis, On 3 Public Relations