Lehigh University Years

Lehigh University Years

At the end of the American Civil War, Miles Rock relocated to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. He had learned of Bethlehem from his brother Edward who lived there during the war, and whom Miles Rock had asked in letters to describe the town and illustrate its landmarks and features. Lehigh University had been founded in Bethlehem in 1865 by Asa Packer. Miles Rock would be a member of the new university’s first graduating class, taking his degree in Civil Engineering and becoming the engineering school’s first graduate from the program. At Lehigh, Miles Rock produced a thesis-length study of the Friedensville, Pennsylvania, zinc mines. At Lehigh, Miles Rock came under the tutelage of the astronomer Alfred M. Mayer. So influential was Mayer on Miles Rock that he named his only son, Alfred Mayer Rock in honor of his professor. While at Lehigh, Miles Rock began his courtship of Susan Clarkson, whom he would later marry. The couple would go on to have two children, Amy Cordoba Rock, and Alfred Mayer Rock, respectively, their marriage lasting until Miles Rock’s death in 1901. It was also at Lehigh that Miles Rock began to mature his ideas about potentially opening and operating a boys’ school in Bethlehem. The project was never realized. But in the meantime, thanks to his experience with Professor Mayer and his work in the newly constructed Sayre Observatory at Lehigh, Miles Rock began to pursue opportunities as a professional astronomer.