Gallery Source: Wikipedia Contributors. “White Dwarf.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 25 May 2021, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_dwarf. Accessed 25 May 2021.Helium was first detected as an unknown, yellow spectral line signature in sunlight, during a solar eclipse in 1868 by Georges Rayet, Captain C. T. Haig, Norman R. Pogson, and Lieutenant John Herschel, and was subsequently confirmed by French astronomer, Jules Janssen.