916 America is a minor planet

Minor planet

An asteroid group or minor-planet group is a population of minor planets that have a share broadly similar orbits. Members are generally unrelated to each other, unlike in an asteroid family, which often results from the break-up of a single asteroid...

 orbiting the Sun

Sun

The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is almost perfectly spherical and consists of hot plasma interwoven with magnetic fields...

 in the main belt between Mars

Mars

Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun in the Solar System. The planet is named after the Roman god of war, Mars. It is often described as the "Red Planet", as the iron oxide prevalent on its surface gives it a reddish appearance...

 and Jupiter

Jupiter

Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the largest planet within the Solar System. It is a gas giant with mass one-thousandth that of the Sun but is two and a half times the mass of all the other planets in our Solar System combined. Jupiter is classified as a gas giant along with Saturn,...

.

It was discovered on 7 August 1915 by the Soviet astronomer Grigory Nikolaevich Neujmin

Grigory Nikolaevich Neujmin

Grigory Nikolayevich Neujmin was a Soviet/Russian astronomer.He is credited with the discovery of 74 asteroids, and notably 951 Gaspra and 762 Pulcova. The Minor Planet Center credits his discoveries under the name G. N. Neujmin, and his surname appears this way in the literature...

 at Simeis, Ukraine

Ukraine

Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...

. Originally designated 916^ΣI, it was renamed '916 America' on 24 February 1923 after the Council of Astronomers at Pulkovo Observatory

Pulkovo Observatory

The Pulkovo Astronomical Observatory астрономи́ческая обсервато́рия Росси́йской акаде́мии нау́к), the principal astronomical observatory of the Russian Academy of Sciences, located 19 km south of Saint Petersburg on Pulkovo Heights...

 decided to commemorate "the friendly relations of the astronomical observatories and astronomers". Another possible reason for the name was as a mark of appreciation for the help given during the famine in Crimea

Crimea

Crimea , or the Autonomous Republic of Crimea , is a sub-national unit, an autonomous republic, of Ukraine. It is located on the northern coast of the Black Sea, occupying a peninsula of the same name...

 by the American Relief Administration

American Relief Administration

American Relief Administration was an American relief mission to Europe and later Soviet Russia after World War I. Herbert Hoover, future president of the United States, was the program director....

 under President Herbert Hoover

Herbert Hoover

Herbert Clark Hoover was the 31st President of the United States . Hoover was originally a professional mining engineer and author. As the United States Secretary of Commerce in the 1920s under Presidents Warren Harding and Calvin Coolidge, he promoted partnerships between government and business...

.

In 1986, assuming that the asteroid was of S-type and that it had a diameter of 15 km, the rotational period was measured to be 38 hours. Observations by the Infrared Astronomical Satellite

IRAS

The Infrared Astronomical Satellite was the first-ever space-based observatory to perform a survey of the entire sky at infrared wavelengths....

 have since shown that it has a diameter of 33.2±1.3 km, with an absolute magnitude

Absolute magnitude

Absolute magnitude is the measure of a celestial object's intrinsic brightness. it is also the apparent magnitude a star would have if it were 32.6 light years away from Earth...

 of 11.20 and an albedo

Albedo

Albedo , or reflection coefficient, is the diffuse reflectivity or reflecting power of a surface. It is defined as the ratio of reflected radiation from the surface to incident radiation upon it...

of 0.053±0.004.