The Day We Found the Universe (51 page)

206 liked to mingle with the elite of Hollywood society rather than astronomers: Dunaway (1989), p. 69.

207 “A stranger could drop raspberry soufflé on the rug without hearing a murmur”: Ibid.

207 “quite out of the common”: A comment made by Susan Ertz, a friend of Grace's from elementary school. HUB, Box 1, Folder 3.

207 “was Watson to his Sherlock Holmes”: HUB, Box 7, “Hubble: A Biographical Memoir.”

207 found even more variables: Hubble (1925a).

207 hundreds of pages now filed away in an archive: The Huntington Library in San Marino, California.

207 he sometimes cut corners in the darkroom: AIP, interview of Nicholas U. Mayall by Bert Shapiro, February 13, 1977; interview of Martin Schwarzschild by Spencer Weart on June 3, 1977.

208 “one lump of beauty mixed with lots of incredible boredom and discomfort”: AIP, interview of Jesse Greenstein by Paul Wright on July 31, 1974.

209 “You … may be interested to hear that variable stars are now being found”: LWA, Hubble to Slipher, July 14, 1924.

209 Slipher had already heard: LWA, Slipher to Hubble, August 8, 1924.

209 The news was rapidly spreading on the astronomical grapevine: HUB, Box 1, “Edwin Hubble and the Existence of External Galaxies” by Michael Hoskin.

209 “What do you think of Hubble's Cepheids”: HUA, van Maanen to Shapley, March 14, 1924.

209 “I feel it is still premature to base conclusions on these variables”: HUA, Hubble to Shapley, August 25, 1924.

210 “exciting” … “What tremendous luck you are having”: HUA, Shapley to Hubble, September 5, 1924.

210 most boisterous promoter: Shapley soon published a popular article titled “Beyond the Bounds of the Milky Way.” HP, Shapley to Hale, April 2, 1925.

210 “I am wasting a good deal of time”: LWA, Hubble to Slipher, December 20, 1924.

211 “Finds Spiral Nebulae Are Stellar Systems”:
New York Times
, November 23, 1924, p. 6.

211 “the rapid progress of knowledge, and the changing state of speculative theories”: Doig (1924), p. 99.

211 “undoubtedly among the most notable scientific advances of the year”: Berendzen, Hart, and Seeley (1984), p. 134.

211 “Heartiest congratulations on your Cepheids in spiral nebulae!”: HUB, Russell to Hubble, December 12, 1924.

212 “considerable interest” in the outcome: “Welfare of World Depends on Science, Coolidge Declares” (1925), p. 9.

212 “The real reason for my reluctance in hurrying to press”: Hubble to Russell, February 19, 1925, in Berendzen and Hoskin (1971), p. 11.

212 “I believe the measured rotations must be abandoned”: Ibid.

212 “an ass!!”: HUB, Stebbins to Hubble, February 16, 1925.

212 “We walked back to the group in the lobby”: Ibid.

213 “I have always believed that the spirals are island universes”: LOA, Curtis to Aitken, January 2, 1925.

213 “Dr. Hubble … has found that the outer parts of the two most conspicuous nebulae”: HUB, Box 9.

213 The Cepheids were fast becoming the gold standard for measuring distances: Russell (1925), p. 103.

213 “The great distances recently derived have made rapid rotation impossible”: Luyten (1926), p. 388.

214 “van Maanen's measurements have to go”: Berendzen, Hart, and Seeley (1984), p. 123.

214 Parasitologist Lemuel Cleveland of the School of Hygiene and Public Health at Johns Hopkins was also honored: “Honor for Dr. Edwin P. Hubble” (1925), pp. 100–101.

214 “To scientists, … the infinite and the infinitesimal are merely relative terms, alike in importance”: “Infinite and Infinitesimal” (1925), p. B4.

215 The Hubbles had just bought an acre lot in San Marino: HUB, Box 7, Grace's memoir. In the late 1970s the Hubble home was placed on the National Register of Historic Places. See Pasadena
Star-News
, April 5, 1977.

215 “If an old scrap of paper, published within the sacred period”: Blades (1930), p. J10.

215 Duncan found three variable stars within the Triangulum nebula, M33: Duncan (1922).

216 colleague at Mount Wilson, George Ritchey, had photographed thousands of “soft star-like condensations” in Andromeda: Ritchey (1910a), p. 32.

216 suggested that strict divisions were in place in Mount Wilson: Shapley (1969), p. 58.

216 “I faithfully went along with my friend van Maanen”: Ibid., p. 80.

217 Shapley was so certain of his position that he proceeded to take a handkerchief out of his pocket and rub out the marks: This story was first published in Smith (1982), p. 144. Smith noted that he found no documentary proof but judged there were “some pointers to its possible truth.” Allan Sandage elaborates on the tale in his history of Mount Wilson. Sandage (2004), pp. 495–98.

217 “spiral nebulae” were on his agenda and that “cosmogony” would be his future field: HUA, Shapley to Kellogg, June 10, 1920, and December 1, 1920.

217 “The work that Hubble did on galaxies was very largely using my methods”: Shapley (1969), pp. 57–58.

217 “in the fields of observation”: Louis Pasteur, Inaugural Lecture, University of Lillé, December 7, 1854.

218 “There is just not one universe”: HUB, Box 28, Scrapbook.

218 catchiest headline: Ibid.

218 “more systems of stars than there are hairs in the whiskers of Santa Claus”: Blades (1930), p. J10.

218 “Professor Edwin Hubble announces that he has found another universe”: “The Universe, Inc.” (1926), 133.

218 “Astronomy, as a matter of popular interest”: “Crowd Jams Library for Hubble Talk” (1927).

218 “It is like looking at those lights”: Blakeslee (1930).

218 did by chance discover “Comet Hubble” in August 1937: HUB, 100-inch Logbook.

218 “I am commuting to a spiral nebula”: HUB, Box 8, biographical memoir.

219 “astronomy is a science in which exact truth is ever stranger than fiction”: Jeans (1929), p. 8.

219 “How terrifying! … nothing at all!”: HUB, Box 10, Folder HUB 195.

220 “I want to get away from both the words universe and nebula”: HUA, Shapley to Hubble, May 29, 1929.

220 didn't see any pressing need to abolish the “venerable precedent” of preserving the word
galaxy:
HUA, Hubble to Shapley, May 15, 1929.

220 “The term
nebulae
offers the values of tradition”: Hubble (1936), p. 18.

220 quickly pinpointed whether they came from the East or West Coast of the United States: Smith (1982), p. 151.

220 “I want to compare them with the novae in spirals”: HUA, van Maanen to Shapley, February 18, 1925.

220 “I am completely at a loss to know what to believe”: HUA, Shapley to van Maanen, March 8, 1925.

220 “what to think of your confounded spirals”: HUA, Shapley to van Maanen, April 6, 1931.

221 “van Maanen's contradiction disturbed her husband so greatly”: Sandage (2004), p. 528.

221 “a decided internal motion in the same direction”: Hale, Adams, and Seares (1931), p. 200.

221 “They asked me to give him time. Well, I gave him time, I gave him ten years”: HUB, Box 16, remembrance by Grace Hubble to Michael Hoskin, March 7, 1968.

221 Van Maanen was sure that Hubble had been heading up a cabal to deny him a fair share of time on the 100-inch. That's when van Maanen slapped his sign on the front of the Blink, warning others not to use the machine without his permission: Christianson (1995), p. 231.

221 The skirmish even extended into the dining room atop Mount Wilson: AIP, interview of Olin Wilson by David DeVorkin on July 11, 1978.

222 “Hubble skillfully employed trial tactics”: Hetherington (1990a), p. 23.

222 “no evidence of motion”: HUB, Box 3, Folder 52.

222 “Its language was intemperate in many places”: HL, Adams Papers, Adams to Merriam, August 15, 1935.

222 resolution involved delicate diplomacy: Hetherington (1990a), p. 10; Sandage (2004), p. 215.

223 “no compromise, no compromise”: AIP, interview of Nicholas U. Mayall, June 3, 1976.

223 “I do not feel that Hubble's attitude in this matter was in any way justified”: HL, Adams Papers, Adams to Merriam, August 15, 1935.

223 “Print what you like, but print it elsewhere”: HP, Seares to Hale, January 24, 1935. Historian Robert Smith was the first to track down the correspondence on this matter and bring this skirmish to light. See Smith (1982), pp. 135–36.

223 “The attitude of van Maanen in the matter was much superior to that of Hubble”: HL, Adams to Merriam, August 15, 1935.

223 “recognized this curious ‘blind spot’ in almost every important dealing”: HL, Adams to Merriam, February 19, 1936.

224 “Great men have to go their own way”: Christianson (1995), p. 225.

224 “With Edwin, it was out of sight, out of mind”: Ibid., p. 61.

224 accompanied by a paper by van Maanen in which he acknowledged the existence of possible errors: Van Maanen's first draft essentially just restated his results. There's considerable evidence that Adams then intervened and dictated some concessionary phrases, which van Maanen agreed to. Brashear and Hetherington (1991), pp. 419–20.

224 brief note came out in the May 1935 issue of the
Astrophysical Journal:
Hubble (1935).

224 had van Maanen's paper immediately follow: Van Maanen (1935).

224 whenever the two passed each other in the observatory hallways, they exchanged not a word: AIP, interviews of Nicholas U. Mayall, June 3, 1976, and February 13, 1977.

14. Using the 100-Inch Telescope the Way It Should Be Used

225 “shun us like a plague”: Eddington (1928), p. 166.

225 more than three hundred delegates attended the gathering, where they were entertained with boat excursions down the city's noted canals: LWA, Lampland to Slipher, July 8, 1928.

225 “Most of the Americans appear to be over here this summer”: LWA, Lampland to Slipher, August 8, 1928.

225 appointed acting chairman of the IAU Nebulae Commission: Stratton (1929), p. 250.

226 his magisterial 1926 paper: Hubble (1926).

226 “consistent with the marked tendency already observed”: Humason (1927), p. 318.

226 de Sitter encouraged Hubble at this time to extend the redshift measurements of the spiral nebulae: This is according to Milton Humason as stated in HUB, Box 7, Grace's memoir.

226 “The Flagstaff assault on these objects”: HUA, Shapley to Russell, May 22, 1929.

227 “I didn't feel much enthusiasm” … “test of endurance”: HUB, Box 7, Grace's memoir.

227 one summer as a teenager … taking any astronomer who wanted to go with him: Sandage (2004), p. 527.

227 Mount Wilson hotel: The hotel was built in 1905 by the Mount Wilson Toll Road and Hotel Company. The original structure burned down in 1913 but was soon rebuilt and remained open until 1963. Sandage (2004), p. 24.

227 tracked the animal down and shot him between the eyes: Sutton (1933b), p. I4.

228 Humason was even put in charge of scheduling telescope time: Sandage (2004), p. 185.

229 He accomplished this feat by establishing a ladder of measurements: Hubble (1929a).

229 to directly obtain the distances to six relatively nearby galaxies: The sixth galaxy was actually done indirectly; it was a companion to one of the five and hence assumed to be a similar distance.

229 “Mr. Strömberg has very kindly checked the general order of these values…. Solutions of this sort have been published by Lundmark”: Hubble (1929a), p. 171.

230 He didn't even like Lundmark: Smith (1982), p. 183.

230 Hubble held up publication of his data to make sure he had nailed down every argument: HUA, Hubble to Shapley, May 15, 1929.

230 “There is more to the advance of science than new observations and new theories”: Hetherington (1996), p. 126.

231 “For such scanty material, so poorly distributed, the results are fairly definite”: Hubble (1929a), p. 170.

232 “I agreed to try one exposure”: AIP, interview of Milton Humason by Bert Shapiro, around 1965.

232 “that the mountain itself is rolling eastward with the earth at ten times an express train's speed”: Sutton (1933a), p. G12.

232 MacCormack calculated a final velocity of 3,779 kilometers per second: Humason (1929), p. 167.

232 The success spurred Mount Wilson officials: AIP, interview of Milton Humason by Bert Shapiro, around 1965.

232 Humason was ready to quit: Ibid.

232 “The high velocity for N. G. C. 7619 derived from these plates”: Humason (1929), p. 167.