page_title: Perkins Observatory
section_title: Early history
hierarchical_section_title: Perkins Observatory / Early history
caption_attribution_description: English: Ohio Wesleyan University Student Observatory. West William Street in Delaware OH 43015 No longer in use, see Perkins Observatory This is an image of a place or building that is listed on the National Register of Historic Places in the United States of America. Its reference number is 85000633
context_page_description: Perkins Observatory is an astronomical observatory in Delaware, Ohio. It is owned and operated by Ohio Wesleyan University.
  In 1931 it had the third largest telescope in the World; the 69 inch aperture Perkins telescope came online at this observatory. The mirror was the largest cast in the United States up to that time, and it was made by the United States National Bureau of Standards.
  In the 1930s this observatory also started periodic document release called The Telescope, featuring results from the telescope but grew to include other astronomical information.
  The University partnered with Ohio State University in 1935, to help run the big telescope and the agreement lasted for almost seven decades. In the 1960s the telescope was moved to Arizona, USA for better viewing conditions, and fitted with new larger mirror. Nevertheless, the Observatory continued to be a hub of astronomical activity in the region and for the University.
  In the 21st century the Observatory supports various public and academic astronomical activities and is a source for information such as NEO flybys in the community.
context_section_description: The observatory is named for Hiram Perkins, a professor of mathematics and astronomy at the Ohio Wesleyan University in Delaware, Ohio from 1857 to 1907. A devoutly religious Methodist and a man of deep convictions, he was also known as an uncompromising and demanding instructor.Perkins' believed that “The public should have an opportunity to see with a great telescope the objects such an instrument reveals and by so doing ‘Learn to love God and serve Him more acceptably.’"
  Perkins graduated from Ohio Wesleyan in 1857, just nine years after the university was founded. He was immediately offered a position on the faculty. Shortly thereafter he married Caroline Barkdull, a graduate from OWU's Women's College.
  In 1861 Perkins temporarily left OWU when the American Civil War began. He intended to enlist in the Union Army, but was deemed physically unfit for service. (At 6’4” tall and 97 pounds, his students referred to him as “the human skeleton.”) Perkins then returned to his family hog farm and worked to help feed the troops. (Salt pork was a staple military food at the time.) Applying his mathematical skills to the science of pork production, by war's end he had amassed an impressive (for the time) fortune. After the war Perkins returned to his university teaching position and lived a very frugal life on his small salary. Meanwhile, his shrewd business investments caused his fortune to multiply considerably.
  In 1896 Professor Perkins donated the funds necessary to build the first of two observatories to bear his name. It is located on West William Street in Delaware, Ohio right next to Hiram and Caroline's former residence.  This original “Perkins Astronomical Observatory” later had its name changed to “the Student Observatory” when the second Perkins Observatory was built a quarter century later.
  Perkins's marriage never produced children. His older sister never married. Therefore, toward the end of his life Perkins realized he had no living relatives to whom to leave his fortune. Retiring in 1907, Professor Perkins applied himself to the creation of “an astronomical observatory of importance.” It was his desire that this second observatory be a place where cutting-edge research could be conducted. It took 15 years to find an appropriate location and secure the necessary funding (Perkins himself provided about $250,000, the equivalent of roughly $3.8 million dollars in 2019, of the approximately $350,000 budget). 
  Construction began in 1923 with the frail 90-year-old professor as Guest of Honor at the groundbreaking ceremony. Within a year, however, both Hiram and Caroline Perkins had died. Neither saw the completion of the new observatory. 
  The building features a reproduction of Robert De Lorain's "Apollo Watering the Horses of the Sun" over the front entrance and a frieze of antique marble panels around the building bears the names of seventeen astronomers:
  The building and telescope mount were completed in less than two years. The work was done by the Warner and Swasey Company of Cleveland, Ohio. (Warner and Swasey also built other observatories and telescopes, including Yerkes Observatory near Chicago, Theodore Jacobsen Observatory in Seattle, Washington, McCormick Observatory in Charlottesville, Virginia, and (of course) the Warner and Swasey Observatory in Cleveland, Ohio.) The building included a lecture room, library, office space, walk-in vault, small bedroom for visiting astronomers, and spacious work rooms and metal fabrication shops. 
  However, Professor Perkins had stipulated that the telescope mirror be cast in the United States. At this time no U.S. companies had experience in casting such a large mirror, so the National Bureau of Standards agreed to take on the project. It can be argued that casting of this mirror launched the optical glass industry in the United States.
  The first four attempts to cast the mirror were unsuccessful. The fifth attempt, using a different technique, created a 69-inch (1.8 m) blank (somewhat larger than originally intended). Three years of grinding and polishing followed. When
caption: The old building (now Ohio Wesleyan University Student Observatory). It was here Perkins actually worked most of his career, as he had died by the time the new observatory was finished in the 1920s.
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