Palomar Mountain Home
Coral Bergman forwarded the following article "Palomar, After 50 Years". I'm
sure many of you will enjoy it immensely. The dedication and commitment of
all the people involved over so many years is very impressive! Applause to
the author for such a wonderful story and his success in preserving this
piece of history so beautifully. - Bonnie Phelps
About the Author:
Ronald Florence is a historian and novelist, the author of six books.
He was educated at the University of California,
Berkeley and received his Ph.D. from Harvard University. He first visited
Palomar as a high school student shortly after Sputnik was
launched. He now lives on the Connecticut shore. You may contact him at
ron@18james.com.
His book The Perfect Machine is the story
of the building of the Hale telescope at Palomar.
It is available
from Amazon.com or bookstores,
including the
Palomar Mountain Store.
Palomar, After 50 Years
by Ronald Florence
Copyright 1998 The Journal San Diego Historical Society, reproduced on
this web page by permission.
The Journey
In November 1947, a 16-wheel trailer from the Belyea Truck Company
carefully backed into an oversized doorway at one end of an odd,
windowless building on the campus of the California Institute of
Technology in Pasadena, California. Belyea, famed for once moving a ship
across the desert, claimed in their advertisements that there was no
cargo they couldn't move.
The object waiting inside the building wasn't the largest or heaviest
cargo Belyea had ever moved, but with a crate over 17 feet square, and
weighing almost 40 tons, it was large enough to require careful
maneuvering, including a good deal of manual manipulation with crowbars
and slide plates to get the trailer and cargo out of the narrow doorway
that had been designed to accommodate this one delivery. Once it was
outside, the huge trailer and cargo, parked on California Avenue and
surrounded by guards, attracted the attention of local and national
reporters. The Caltech public relations office had received suspicious
phone calls about the shipment, and were eager to hold down the
opportunities for potential troublemakers to interfere with the
delivery. They promised the reporters advance notice of the departure in
return for their agreement to embargo all news about the shipment until
after the tractor and trailer left the campus.
To continue reading, click on the following site:
Journal of San Diego History,
http://edweb.sdsu.edu/edweb_folder/SDHS/journal/98fall/palomar.htm
Palomar Mountain home, http://www.palomarmountain.com