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THE MOUNT STROMLO FIRES:
A MAJOR HERITAGE LOSS FOR AUSTRALIAN ASTRONOMY

On 2003 January 18 a fire-storm swept through part of Canberra, the Australian capital, destroying more than 500 homes and severely damaging many more, claiming four lives, and largely destroying Mount Stromlo Observatory (MSO).

From a history of astronomy perspective this is a major catastrophe, as the following historically-significant telescopes were lost:

• 74-in (Grubb-Parsons) Reflector (Figure 1)
• 50-in 'Great Melbourne Telescope' (Figure 2)
• 30-in Reynolds Reflector (Figure 3)
• 9-in Oddie Refractor (Figure 4)
• 26-in Yale-Columbia Refractor (Figure 5)

Figure 1

Figure 2

The 74-in Reflector (Figure 1) was commissioned in 1955, and for two decades remained the equal-largest reflector in the Southern Hemisphere. It was used extensively for spectroscopic research, thanks largely to the magnificent coudé spectrograph installed by T. Dunham, even after Stromlo established its Siding Spring outstation and furnished this with 16, 24, and 40-in Boller and Chivens reflectors, and eventually the 2.3m Advanced Technology Telescope.

The 50-in Reflector (Figure 2) was known colloquially as the 'The Great Melbourne Telescope', but in fact the only elements of the original 48-in Great Melbourne Telescope that formed part of it were the polar axis, half of the declination axis and the mirror cell. In recent years this telescope has been used for the MACHO Project - the search for the Universe's enigmatic 'missing mass'.

Figure 3

Figure 4

The 30-in Reynolds Reflector (Figure 3) was installed at MSO in 1927-30, but only became a popular research instrument after WWII, and has been used ever since - mainly for photoelectric photometry. This telescope was donated to the Australian Government by the wealthy British amateur astronomer, J.H. Reynolds, and in 1970 was refurbished, complete with a new mounting inspired in part by a Boller & Chivens design.

The oldest telescope at MSO was the 9-in Grubb refractor (Figure 4) donated by an Australian amateur named Oddie. Between 1911 and 1913, Melbourne Observatory staff used this instrument to site-test at Mount Stromlo after the Government agreed to found a solar observatory near Canberra. The Commonwealth Solar Observatory opened in 1924, and during the 1930s the Oddie Telescope was used for stellar spectroscopy. In more recent years it served an educational function, while still housed in its original dome.

As the name would suggest, the initial raison d'être of the Commonwealth Solar Observatory was solar research, and during the 1930s and 1940s Claborn Allen (of Astrophysical Quantities fame) used a solar telescope for pioneering investigations of the Fraunhofer lines in the solar spectrum. With Woolley's appointment as director in 1939 the focus of the Observatory shifted to non-solar astronomy and 'Solar' was dropped from the name. It was through Woolley's initiative that the Observatory acquired the 50 and 74-in reflectors.

Woolley also arranged for the 26-in Yale-Columbia refractor (Figure 5) to be moved to Stromlo in 1955, from its original base in South Africa. The lens was worked by McDowell of Pittsburgh in 1923, while the telescope and mounting were fabricated in the Yale University workshop. In 1925 the telescope was installed at the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, where it was used for stellar parallax work. For a while it served a similar research function at Stromlo, but in recent years has been used by local amateurs for serious research programs. A photograph of this telescope appeared in the January 20 issue of The Australian newspaper, and this is reproduced here as Figure 6. The 'before and after' comparison is a sobering experience!

Figure 5

Figure 6

In addition to its telescopes, the Observatory's library was destroyed, along with the archives. The library was an excellent research resource for historians of astronomy, with long runs of all of the vital journals, and many lesser-known ones. I have made extensively use of this library over the years, and it will be sorely missed. Some of Stromlo's own archives were also lost, but fortunately the Great Melbourne Telescope records (including pioneering spectroscopic observations, drawings of galaxies and nebulae, and exquisite sketches of Jupiter and of comets) are safe. Some years ago they were removed from Stromlo and transferred to the National Archives of Australia.

Unfortunately, there are no detailed historical accounts of any of the Stromlo telescopes, but we can expect that some useful material about them will be included in the history of the Observatory that Tom Frame and Don Faulkner are close to completing. In the mean time, some information about the instrumentation and research programs at the Observatory can be found in the books and research papers listed below. Finally, I would like to acknowledge that most of the photographs in this report were taken from Don Faulkner's excellent 1998 booklet (see below).

Some publications about the history of MSO:

Allen, C.W., 1978. The beginnings of the Commonwealth Solar Observatory. Records of the Australian Academy of Science, 4, 27-49.

Davies, S., 1984. R.v.d.R. Woolley in Australia. Historical Records of Australian Science, 6, 59-69

Faulkner, D., [1998]. Mount Stromlo and Siding Spring Observatories. A Pictorial History. MSSSO, Canberra.

Gascoigne, S.C.B., 1968. Arthur Robert Hogg. Records of the Australian Academy of Science, 1, 58-70.

Gascoigne, S.C.B., 1982. Bok, Woolley and Australian astronomy. Historical Records of Australian Science, 9, 119-126.

Gascoigne, S.C.B., 1984. Astrophysics at Mount Stromlo: the Woolley Era. Proceedings of the Astronomical Society of Australia, 5, 597-605.

Gascoigne, B., 1994. Mount Stromlo Observatory. The early years. Sky & Space, 7(3), 18-21.

Gascoigne, B., 1995. Mount Stromlo Observatory. The modern years. Sky & Space, 8(1), 24-28.

Haynes, R., Haynes, R., Malin, D., and McGee, R., 1996. Explorers of the Southern Sky. A History of Australian Astronomy. CUP, Cambridge (Chapter 7, pp. 152-194).

Hyland, A.R., and Faulkner, D.J., 1989. From the Sun to the Universe — The Woolley and Bok directorships at Mount Stromlo. Proceedings of the Astronomical Society of Australia, 8, 216-228.

Morris-Kennedy, P., 1989. A celestial centenary. [of the Oddie Telescope]. Southern Astronomy, 2(1), 30-34.

Dr Wayne Orchiston
Anglo-Australian Observatory, Australia Telescope National Facility, and
Secretary IAU Commission 41
2003 February 21