MIGUEL P. SELGA, S.J. (1879-1956)

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Born in Rajadell (Barcelona), Spain, he entered the Society of Jesus in 1895. He studied sciences in the University of Zaragoza and obtained his licentiate in1908. In 1913 and 1914 he visited the American observatories of Georgetown (Washington), Harvard, Boston, Yerkes (Wisconsin) and Lowell (Arizona) where he worked on stellar photography and photometry and Lick Observatory (California) where he worked on stellar spectra and binary stars. In 1915 he traveled to Manila and in 1926 was appointed director of the Manila Observatory and of the Philippine Weather Bureau, succeeding Algué. From 1925 to 1927 Selga was professor of astronomy and meteorology at the University of the Philippines . His main fields of research were astronomy and meteorology. He studied binary stars and stellar spectrography, and the occurrence of typhoons in the Philippines . In 1945 he witnessed the destruction of the observatory by the Japanese Army. He retired as Director in 1948.

(Source: Udias, Agustin. (2003). Searching the heavens and the earth: the history of Jesuit Observatories. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Press)