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4-inch Clark Corporation guide telescope on 61-inch Wyeth reflector
Date: 1929
Inventory Number: 2016-1-0039
Classification: Telescope
Subject:
Maker: Alvan Clark and Sons (1846 - 1958)
Associate Name: J. W. Fecker, Inc. (founded 1926)
User: Oak Ridge Station (1931 - 2005)
User: George R. Agassiz Station, Harvard (1951 - 1982)
User: Harvard College Observatory (founded 1839)
Cultural Region:
Place of Origin:
City of Use:
Bibliography:
Alvan Clark & Sons: Artists in Optics
Description:
This 4-inch aperture guidescope was made by the Clark Corporation and used as a guide scope on the Wyeth 61-inch reflector at Oak Ridge Observatory.
2016-1-0039 is the full tube assembly and its components.
2016-1-0039a is the objective.
2016-1-0039b is a potentiometer attached to the guide scope
2016-1-0039c is the focuser sleeve
2016-1-0039 is the full tube assembly and its components.
2016-1-0039a is the objective.
2016-1-0039b is a potentiometer attached to the guide scope
2016-1-0039c is the focuser sleeve
Signedon tailpiece in cursive: The Alvan Clark & Sons Corp'n / Cambridge, Mass.
Inscribedserial no. on tailpiece: 2009
Historical AttributesThis Alvan Clark & Sons Corporation telescope served as one of two guide scopes on the 61-inch Wyeth reflecting telescope at Oak Ridge Observatory.
The Wyeth was designed and built by J. W. Fecker of Pittsburgh in 1932-1933. It became operational in 1934. It had a fork-type mounting and instruments could be used at both the Newtonian and Cassegrain foci. Like its twin in Bloemfontein, South Africa (the 60-inch Rockefeller Reflector), the Wyeth originally used a 60-inch mirror made by A. A. Common, which was purchased in 1904. In 1936, the mirror was replaced with a 61-inch Pyrex mirror.
The 61-inch Wyeth reflector was the largest telescope east of Texas. It was decommissioned in 2005.
The primary observing program of the Wyeth included photo-electric photometry and spectroscopy.
Instrumentation included a CCD camera for astrometric studies of comets and asteroids, and an echelle spectrograph used for radial velocity studies of stars and searches for exoplanets. It was with this echelle spectrograph that Harvard astronomer David W. Latham discovered the first exoplanet in 1988.
The Wyeth’s photographic plate series is SH. It took 4x5 inch plates. Scale: 25 arcsec/mm Focal length; 321 inches
Plate numbers
279-575 Oak Ridge 1934/03/20 – 1936/02/07 (60-inch Common)
576-13830 Oak Ridge 1937/02/17 – 1989/10/27 (61-inch Pyrex)
The Wyeth was designed and built by J. W. Fecker of Pittsburgh in 1932-1933. It became operational in 1934. It had a fork-type mounting and instruments could be used at both the Newtonian and Cassegrain foci. Like its twin in Bloemfontein, South Africa (the 60-inch Rockefeller Reflector), the Wyeth originally used a 60-inch mirror made by A. A. Common, which was purchased in 1904. In 1936, the mirror was replaced with a 61-inch Pyrex mirror.
The 61-inch Wyeth reflector was the largest telescope east of Texas. It was decommissioned in 2005.
The primary observing program of the Wyeth included photo-electric photometry and spectroscopy.
Instrumentation included a CCD camera for astrometric studies of comets and asteroids, and an echelle spectrograph used for radial velocity studies of stars and searches for exoplanets. It was with this echelle spectrograph that Harvard astronomer David W. Latham discovered the first exoplanet in 1988.
The Wyeth’s photographic plate series is SH. It took 4x5 inch plates. Scale: 25 arcsec/mm Focal length; 321 inches
Plate numbers
279-575 Oak Ridge 1934/03/20 – 1936/02/07 (60-inch Common)
576-13830 Oak Ridge 1937/02/17 – 1989/10/27 (61-inch Pyrex)
ProvenanceOak Ridge Observatory, Harvard, MA., Building 6; transferred to CHSI, 2016.
Published ReferencesDeborah Jean Warner and Robert B. Ariail, Alvan Clark & Sons; Artists in Optics, 2nd ed. (Richmond: Willman-Bell with the National Museum of American History, 1995), 110, 197.