US observational astronomer who discovered the fifth satellite of Jupiter 1892 and Barnard's star 1916. He was the first to realize that the apparent voids in the Milky Way are in fact dark nebulae of dust and gas.

Barnard was born in Nashville, Tennessee, and from the age of nine worked as an assistant in a photographic studio. A fascination with astronomy led him to take a job in the observatory at Vanderbilt University, where he spent most of his time using the telescopes. He went to California to work at the Lick Observatory when it opened 1888. In 1895 he took up the chair of practical astronomy at the University of Chicago and became astronomer at the Yerkes Observatory, Wisconsin. He participated in an expedition to Sumatra, Indonesia, to observe the solar eclipse of 1901.
Barnard discovered his first comet 1881 and by 1892 he had found 16. He also investigated the surface features of Jupiter.