History of Telescopes and the Revolutionary Launch of the Hubble Space Telescope

Up until a few 400 years ago, the only thing mankind knew about the universe was from many many passed down stories and observations seen with the human eye. Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei decided to apply his knowledge and build his own telescope in 1610; a crude refracting telescope. His telescope “ It had a convex objective lens and a concave eyepiece in a long tube.” () He published Sidereus nuncius or The Starry Messenger, which was where he found most of his fame. In his novel, he explained his observations of what he had seen through his telescope; new information on celestial beings, the moon, Jupiter and Saturn.

When he first pointed his telescope to the heavens, It was something that no other had done before; he gathered from his invention that Jupiter had moons while Saturn has rings and that there were stars in the milky way. Because of this first ever invention, scientists are able to discover more and more about the universe each and every day. His new observations of change the view on all creatures, our universe, and galaxies forever.

In the centuries that followed Galileo, Telescopes were able to evolve in size, shape, and power. New information came out about how find a clear view of space; such as placing the telescope as far away from city lights and above all the haze of the population. More and more observations came out as the telescopes increased in power and the scientists could discover more about the galaxies.

One of the greatest telescopes of all time is the Hubble Space telescope. A space telescope was first proposed by Lyman Spitzer in 1946; No satellite had been launched into orbit before Hubble On October 1st 1977, congress founded the project of sending a large telescope into orbit and the grinding of primary mirror for Hubble began. In 1983, the Large Space Telescope found its name in honor of astronomer Edwin Hubble, “who proved that there were other galaxies in our universe and that they are moving away from our Milky Way galaxy at increasing speed the farther away they are.” (Hubble history timeline)After decades of preparation and planning Hubble is the first telescope to be placed in space, away from all the city lights, and hazy atmosphere.

Hubble launched on April 24th, 1990 from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, changing the view of space forever. (hubbly history timeline). Hubble orbits the earth 340 miles (540 kilometers) above the earth and it takes approximately 95 minutes to complete one orbit around the earth, with a speed of 17,000 mph. Hubble’s mass is 11,100 kilograms before the lanuch in 1990. (hubblesite).

One of Hubble’s main accomplishments was assuring the age of the universe. Because of data found by Hubble, researchers now can come to the conclusion that the earth is about 13.7 billion years old from Hubble’s help in discovering the rate at which the universe is expanding. This information allows for researchers to also understand more about different galaxies, seasons on other planets, and black holes.