The 200” Hale telescope is the forth in a series of large telescopes that George Hale envisioned and was the driving force that made those projects successful. He built the largest telescope in the world four times in a row! At the start of this project in 1938 there were several major inventions required to even make a telescope of this size possible. There are several books that chronicle the fascinating story of the construction of this telescope that are worth reading. This is a selection of photos from two visits to Palomar in the early 90’s. On the second visit I was privileged to spend three nights with astronomers as they worked on two projects related to proper motion of stars and a quasar hunt.
