Telescopes from the Ground Up:

Site Map

Reflecting Telescopes

Era of Newton’s Reflector

• Newton's Reflector

Era of Early Reflectors

• Hadley’s Reflector
• Herschel’s Reflectors
  • Discovery 1781: A new planet
• Lord Rosse’s Reflectors
  • Discovery 1845: Cloudy objects are really spirals
• Melbourne Reflector

Era of Huge Reflectors

• Ritchey’s 60-inch Reflector
• Hooker 100-inch Reflector
  • Discovery 1923: Other galaxies exist
• Hale 200-inch Reflector

Era of Solar Telescopes

• Snow Solar Telescope

Era of Radio Telescopes

• Reber’s Radio Telescope
• Very Large Array (VLA)

Era of Multi-Mirror Telescopes

• Multiple Mirror Telescope (MMT)
• The Keck Telescopes

Era of Space Telescopes

• Cosmic Background Observer (COBE)
• Hubble Space Telescope (HST)
• Compton Gamma-Ray Observatory (CGRO)
• Chandra X-ray Observatory
• Spitzer Space Telescope
• Webb Space Telescope

Refracting Telescopes

Era of Galileo’s Refractor

• Galileo’s Refractor

Era of Early Refractors

• Hevelius’s Refractors
  • Discovery 1647: Hevelius maps the Moon
• Huygen's Refractors

Era of Great Refractors

• Harvard Refractor
• Naval Observatory
• Yerkes Refractor

Biographies

• Basri, Gibor (1951–)
• Cannon, Annie Jump (1863–1941)
• Galileo (1564–1642)
• Hale, George Ellery (1868–1938)
• Herschel, Caroline (1750–1848)
• Herschel, William (1738–1822)
• Hevelius, Johannes (1611–1687)
• Hubble, Edwin (1889–1951)
• Newton, Isaac (1642–1727)
• Reber, Grote (1910–1999)
• Spitzer, Lyman (1914–1997)
• Whipple, Fred L. (1906–1944)