 In 1917, at the Royal Observatory at the Cape of Good Hope, the Dutch astronomer Joan Voûte measured the star's trigonometric parallax at and determined that Proxima Centauri was approximately the same distance from the Sun as Alpha Centauri.It was also found to be the lowest-luminosity star known at the time.An equally accurate parallax determination of Proxima Centauri was made by American astronomer Harold L. Alden in 1928, who confirmed Innes's view that it is closer, with a parallax of .