Astronomer Essay

George E. Hale was a famous astronomer who won many awards for his contributions to astronomy and the scientific field before dying in early 1938. He attended MIT, the observatory at Harvard, and at Berlin. While he was an undergraduate at MIT, he invented the spectroheliograph which he used to make discoveries about the sun, including the solar vortices and the magnetic fields of sunspots. He became the director of Kenwood Astrophysical observatory, and became a professor at two colleges in Chicago. He would later become the editor of the Astrophysical Journal.
While at Kenwood Observatory, George E. Hale first put the spectroheliograph, invented at MIT, to practical use. The spectralheliograph works by capturing a photographic image of the sun at a single wavelength of light. It does this by using a prism to separate the wavelengths of light and a narrow slit. While using the spectralheliograph, Hale discovered that sunspots are at relatively lower temperatures than other parts of the sun. Kenwood Observatory was constructed by George Hale’s father and Kenwood’s primary instrument was a 12 inch refractor telescope. The telescope was used in conjunction with Rowland grating as part of the spectroheliograph. Hale’s work at the Kenwood Observatory sparked the interest of many in the astronomical community.
George E. Hale worked to found many significant observatories. These observatories include Yerkes Observatory at the University of Chicago, Mount Wilson Observatory, Palomar Observatory, and the Hale Solar Laboratory. While at Mount Wilson Observatory in Los Angeles, Hale would receive a 1.5 m. telescope as a gift from France. The design of the telescope allowed for allowed for the pioneering of spectroscopic analysis, parallax measurements, nebula photography and photometric photography. The Hale telescope was one of the largest telescopes in use for many decades. Also while at Mount Wilson Observatory, Hale hired and encouraged Harlow Shapley and Edwin Hubble. Hale also helped make the California Institute of Technology into a top research university.
Hale also won many awards during his lifetime and had many astronomical objects named after him. Among his many awards, he was awarded the Galileo medal in 1920, the Actonian prize in 1921, the gold medal of the royal astronomical society in 1904, the Franklin gold medal in 1927, and the Bruce Medal in 1916. Among the objects named after Hale were the 22-year solar Hale cycle, the asteroid 1024 Hale, and a crater on the moon and a crater on mars. George E. Hale also had an award named in his honor, as the George Ellery Hale Prize for the Solar Physics Department of the American Astronomical Society.
George E. Hale, as he grew older suffered from neurological and psychological problems, including insomnia, and schizophrenia and would often report that there was an elf that would visit him regularly and advise him on his work. He spent months at a time in sanitariums.