How have astronomers and physicists responded to the challenge of getting “beyond the atmosphere” in the past century or so, and how did they go about making choices in how they did so? This case study examines a particularly poignant example of how an astronomer’s practice changed in the 1950s when that astronomer, Princeton theoretical astrophysicist Martin Schwarzschild, made a commitment to utilize newly improved balloon technology to answer a specific question arising from his own research agenda. Here we follow Schwarzschild’s efforts, which led initially to success, and then examine how, bolstered by his department Chairman, Lyman Spitzer, he built upon that success to generalize the new technology to try to provide a capability that might address a wider range of questions, and, aiding Spitzer’s plan, provide a stepping stone to an eventual Large Space Telescope. How he fared in making this decision reveals the challenges facing academic astronomers in the 1950s who attempted to send their telescopes aloft. It also reveals the complexities of taking on such projects, complexities that were unknown to the average mainstream astronomer.
...MoreSimilar Citations
Book
Leverington, David;
(2000)
New Cosmic Horizons: Space Astronomy from the V2 to the Hubble Space Telescope
(/isis/citation/CBB000101887/)
Article
Aït-Touati, Frédérique;
(2012)
“Give Me a Telescope and I Shall Move the Earth”: Hooke's Attempt to Prove the Motion of the Earth from Observations
(/isis/citation/CBB001230394/)
Chapter
Asim Gangopadhyaya;
(2019)
Il contributo di Galileo alla meccanica
(/isis/citation/CBB589493169/)
Article
Talebian, Mohammad;
Talebian, Ehsan;
(2012)
Alenush Terian: The Iranian Solar Mother
(/isis/citation/CBB001221646/)
Book
Angelo Adamo;
(2022)
Domicili cosmici
(/isis/citation/CBB783864081/)
Book
John Logsdon;
(2015)
After Apollo?: Richard Nixon and the American Space Program
(/isis/citation/CBB495581251/)
Book
Ferris, Timothy;
Hawking, Stephen;
Lightman, Alan;
Novikov, Igor;
Thorne, Kip;
(2002)
The Future of Spacetime
(/isis/citation/CBB000201366/)
Chapter
Pietro Di Mauro;
Angelo Pagano;
(2017)
Criticism of the “vectoralists” Burali-Forti and Boggio to General Relativity
(/isis/citation/CBB966141907/)
Article
Harry E. Petschek;
(1996)
Glimpses of Space Physics in the 1960s and 1990s
(/isis/citation/CBB753883293/)
Article
Juan G. Roederer;
(2019)
Space Physics from Both Ends of the Americas, 1949–2019
(/isis/citation/CBB594139343/)
Book
Graham-Smith, Francis;
(2013)
Unseen Cosmos: The Universe in Radio
(/isis/citation/CBB001553330/)
Book
Pierre Léna;
(2020)
Astronomy’s Quest for Sharp Images: From Blurred Pictures to the Very Large Telescope
(/isis/citation/CBB331621161/)
Book
Kathryn D. Sullivan;
(2019)
Handprints on Hubble: An Astronaut's Story of Invention
(/isis/citation/CBB905524834/)
Book
DeVorkin, David H.;
Smith, Robert W.;
(2004)
The Hubble Space Telescope: Imaging the Universe
(/isis/citation/CBB000771518/)
Article
Clabby, Catherine;
(2013)
A New Looking Glass: Historic Harvard Plates
(/isis/citation/CBB001320842/)
Book
Edmondo Lupieri;
Paolo Ponzio;
(2019)
Chi ha rubato i cieli? : Galileo, la "Lettera a Cristina" e le origini della modernità
(/isis/citation/CBB946509573/)
Book
Payne, Alina Alexandra;
(2012)
The Telescope and the Compass: Teofilo Gallaccini and the Dialogue between Architecture and Science in the Age of Galileo
(/isis/citation/CBB001201625/)
Article
Wright, Aaron Sidney;
(2014)
The Advantages of Bringing Infinity to a Finite Place: Penrose Diagrams as Objects of Intuition
(/isis/citation/CBB001201044/)
Book
Nils Viktor Emanuel Nordenmark;
(2016)
The Invention of the Achromatic and Aplanatic Lens: With Special Regard to the Role Played by Samuel Klingenstierna
(/isis/citation/CBB164571440/)
Book
Massimo Capaccioli;
(2020)
L’incanto di Urania: Venticinque secoli di esplorazione del cielo
(/isis/citation/CBB768291559/)
Be the first to comment!