History
of the Jones Observatory
This is a picture of the Jones Observatory taken
on completion of the building in 1936 by Bruce Jones from
a tree in the front yard. The Observatory was built for the
Chattanooga school system as a PWA Grant. The Observatory
was leased for one dollar for 99 years to the University of
Chattanooga during the second World War by the City of Chattanooga.
Mayor Bass at the time said it was to sophisticated for public
school children of Chattanooga. (How little he knew.)
This is the rotunda
as you are entering the main entrance. You can see the column
to the telescope on your left. Clarence Jones is here talking
to two visitors, showing the glass transparencies. These transparencies
show astronomical pictures from Yerkes Observatory (University
of Chicago) and are still here today.
Here you see
Clarence Jones (on the left) and Arthur Jones, his son and
University of Tennessee student at the time, truing up the
mirror blank (in order to make it perfectly round and flat).
This blank was one of five test pourings for the 200 inch
mirror at the Palomar Observatory.
This is the grinding
and polishing machine built by the Jones for finishing the
mirrors on the 20.5 inch Cassegrainian telescope. The machine
was located in the basement workshop of the observatory. The
telescope saw first light in 1938.
Here you see
Arthur Jones repairing the polishing lap on the plaster of
paris foundation.
Photo above is
of the 24 inch telescope of the Franklin Institute in 1935
as set up in the J.W.Fecker shop. The telescope was later
mounted in a roll off roof observatory. This is the Telescope
that Mr. Jones was interested in for the Chattanooga observatory.
The price of this telescope was about $20,000, a lot of money
in 1936. The only thing to do was make one himself.
More later
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