Mt. Wilson History- Sophie Ungless



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While many people may not know the name Mount Wilson, they most likely know about at least one of the many historical discoveries that have been made there. Mount Wilson Observatory was founded in 1904 by George Hale, and originally was mainly used to study the sun with the 60-inch Snow Solar Telescope. As the largest telescope at the time, it was a trial to get it on top of the mountain in Pasadena. According to Mount Wilson Observatory’s website, it took 60 trips to carry all the pieces for the telescope to the top, and everything was carried on horses’ or mules’ backs. It took a few years for building to be completed and to work out some issues, so the 60-inch telescope was completed in 1908. 

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The Snow Telescope held the record for the largest telescope until 1917 when the 100-inch telescope was built for Mount Wilson Observatory. Hale was adamant about having the tool built, which came with a $500,000 price tag for the telescope itself and for the new building that would house it. There were many obstacles that Hale and his team at the observatory would have to overcome such as how to mount such a large, heavy piece of glass and how to prevent it from steaming up as the Earth’s atmosphere warmed and cooled. The most interesting issue that the scientists ran into, in my opinion, was the fact that the 9,000 pound glass disk was full of small air bubbles. At first, Hale and his team thought that the glass was useless because of this, but after multiple failed attempts to make a new, perfect disk, Walter Adams discovered that the bubbles actually did not pose an issue. They actually are beneficial with handling the Earth’s changing temperature.

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One of the most notable discoveries made at Mount Wilson Observatory was by Edwin Hubble, which shocked me I have heard his name in science classes since I was young. In 1923, Hubble used the 100-inch telescope to discover a variable in a spiral nebula called Andromeda. By doing so, Hubble was able to measure the distance to the nebula, which proved that it was actually another galaxy. After this discovery, Hubble partnered with Milton L. Humason to observe and make note of the magnitudes of the redshifts in galaxies, and used the information gathered to publish a paper about the universe expanding. 

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