Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1898-04-15
STARS ATCLOSE RANGE
A GIANT TELESCOPE THAT WILL
BRING THEM NEAR.
IN >tro-IIunSarian Officer Has
an Invention That hc Claims Has
Mnrc Power Than the YcrkcS
Iclc>c"re-lt Can b Enlarged.

MbfS POWER nan tnS SrkC
Telescope Can BE- Enlarged.
>cw York Herald
The account was recently published
hv DIR. Elmer Gates of his new ap
pIratu>, which promised to rcvolu
TONIC the methods of Astronomical
observation by making it possible t.
secure far greater magnitication of tn,
heavenly bodies than heretofore
Now comes Herr Johann Mayer, roya
and imperial iirst.lieutcnant in tn,
SiNty-thlrd regiment of Austro-Hun.
garlan infantry, and stationed in
Bistritc, who claims that he has in
vented an apparatus through which
results can be obtained far SURPRISING
those promised by DR.. Gates method
Lieutenant Mayer writes description
OF his apparatus accompanied by
drawings made by himself.
Prof. Gates proposed to accomplish
this object by what he calls n tele.
microscope, combination of tele
scope, microscope and photography
the pictured results Of which he sums
up i'll the one word, telephotomicro
graphs. DIR. Gates realized that il
was not so difficult a matter to secure
enormous magniiications, but that the
trouble was TO get enough light and
definition. And he proposed to over.
come this difficulty by his method.
Herr Mayer has also taken this diff.
ticulty into account, and to overcome
it, while securing the requisite mag
MITIGATION, he proposes an ingenious
apparatus.
An idea of what Herr Mayer claims
for his apparatus may be formed by
considering that while Prof. Gates
expects to be able to bring the moon
to within from twenty to thirty miles
OF the earth, Herr ODER Lieutenant
Mayer asserts that he can bring it
within pistol shot. For he claims
that his apparatus will so magnify OBJ
jects that we can sec details of the
moon as clearly rs if that heavenly
body were no further than only 800
feet from the earth.
He claims that his proposed tele-
scope, while extremely simple in con-
struction and based upon obvious
principles of optics, will possess a
thousand fold the power of the great
est lens in the world, namely that of
the Yerkes telescope.
Herr Meyer seems to consider that
the limit of possibility in the con.
struction of lenses has been reached
in the Yerkes and Lick telescopes the
lenses Of which are respectively thirty
six and forty inches in diameter. But
even were it possible to greatly in
crease the size of lenses, even could a
lens Of thirty feet diameter be manu-
fsctured, there would be a drawback
to its use which would prove fatal to
the further development of the lens
system Of astronomical observation.
For the greater the lens in diameter
the thicker it must be at the center,
and the thicker it is the more light il
absorbs.
Against the system of lens enlarge
mcnt Herr Mayer places a telescope
in which a parabolic mirror of huge
proportions and microscope with
enormous enlarsing powers are the
most prominent features. He calls at
tentiOn to the fact that mirrors
power Of rejecting is entirely indie
pendent of its size, and that you can
enlarge a mirror without mourning
the fatal objection that it will absorb
light. 1t is only necessary that the
mirror should be properly constructed
and in this case be exactly parabolic.
As Herr Mayer says it would be q
simple matter with the advanced me.
chanical skill of to-day to construct a
parabolic mirror of $50 feet diameter.
OF course such mirror could not
be made of one piece, but would con.
sist Of number of scientifically con-
structed segments properly united. In
fact, Herr Mayer claims that even a
far more colossal mirror than this
could be constructed by his method.
But taking one of fifty yards diameter,
that would produce such a strong
miniature picture of the object upon
which the telescope is trained, and the
light effects would be so perfect (no
light being absorbed by the apparatus)
that it would be possible to magnify
this picture millions of times
Briefly summed up, Herr Mayors
telescope consists OF a huge parabolic
mirror in whose focus he suspends a
small convex parabolic mirror which
throws the rays received by the large
mirror upon the lens of the micro
scope connected with the apparatus.
The original feature which Herr
Mayer claims for his apparatus is of
course the use of the enormous para.
bolic mirror and the small convex one
as well as his ability to dispense en-
tirely with the usual telescope tube.
In manufacturing his apparatus
Herr Mayer will first construct para
bolic steel frame movable around a
fixed point. The various segments of
the mirror. concerning which he gives
exact measurements, and also in.