Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1911-02-03
HINSDALE, N. H.
John D. Hooker's Gift Of Powerful Teies-
cope for Mt. Wilson.

cope Tor MT. WILSON.
Hinsdale people are much interested
in the astronomical developments at the
observatory in Mount Wilson, Cal, and
in the great rejecting telescope which
is being installed and which Is three
times as powerful as the one now in use
there. The new telescope is the gift of
John d. Hooker of Los Angeles, for
merry of this town. This great glass re-
flecting mirror at first was rejected as
faulty, but astronomers are now di-
recting the work of grinding and re-
ducing it, experimentally, in the hope
that a perfect 1OO-inch rejecting teles-
cope may be made of 1t. Many months
of labor will be required to reduce the
great piece of glass to the absolutely per-
feet concavity necessary for a reflect
ing mirror Should the work be- sue
cessful the dream of Mr. Hooker and
his friend, Andrew Carnegie, will be real
lied. Months, possibly years, will elapse
before the still greater mirrors, which
Mr. Hooker Is providing for the great
new telescope, will be ready for mount
ing. This larger lens is now in the
annealing oven of the famous glass works
at St. Gobains, France 1t was cast and
put into the oven Dec. 5 and not until
Feb. 5, can it be taken out. One can
imagine the anxiety of those most in
terested when 1t is known that when the
oven can be opened it may be found that
the glass has cracked in cooling, in
which case there would be a delay of
months in casting and anneallng another
lens, which, in turn might split in the
annealing process. The glass now in the
oven is the fifth cast. 1t is estimated
that the cost will be 100000, but what
ever the cost Mr.. Hooker will provide 1t
If the glass can be cast and reduced.
In the meantime these two veterans
and close friends, Mr.. Carnegie, 49, and
Mr. Hooker 70, are anXiously looking
forward to the mounting of the imperfect
casting made perfect now in the observa-
tory's laboratory at Pasadena. 1t Is the
hope of these two old friends that they
will live to see what celestial wonders
can be brought to the knowledge of the
world by a rejecting telescope three
times as powerful as the one now on
Mount Wilson, the greatest in the world.
Twill it be in our day, John?' eagerly
asked Mr.. Carnegie on the occasion of
his last visit to Los Angeles. To the
end that it may be sin our day." Mr..
Hooker is devoting his energies. Pro-
fessor Hale, at the observatory on Mount
Wilson, Cal, has already discovered co.
900 new worlds. and with the far more
powerful telescope perfected the won
ders that may be revealed stagger the
imagination of the most sanguine as
tronomer.
1t may not be amiss to say that Pro-
fessor Hale's mother was born in Hins-
dale, in the house now owned and oc-
supied by f. A. Davis, her father, Rev.
C. S. Brown, being at that time pastor
of the Congregational church here. His
father was a son of Rev. Benjamin Hale,
who at the same time was settled over
the Congregational church in Chester
field.
AS is well known. Mr. Carnegie has
recently given to the Carnegie institu-
tr1t Of Drf1, OF lit
which the Mount Wilson observatory Is
an outgrowth. $1OOOO.OOO. making his en-
tire endowment of the institution, to the
present time $25, OO0, 900.