Russell W. Porter, arctic explorer, artist, telescope maker

By Berton C Willard

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• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0870271687
• ISBN13: 9780870271687
• Release Date: January 1976
• Publisher: Bond Wheelwright Company
• Length: 274 Pages
• Weight: 1.40 lbs.

Customer Reviews

A rare look at a dedicated amateur astronomer...

It's too bad that more amateur astronomers are not aware of the incredibly rich legacy of our hobby. Going back to the late 19th and early 20th centuries, amateur telescope making was a booming hobbyist industry. Much of the credit goes to men like Leslie Peltier, William Tyler Olcott, and the subject of this book, Russell Porter.After satisfying his desire to explore the arctic and climb mountains, Porter settled down in rural Vermont, where he started grinding mirrors and making telescopes. Trained as an architect, he had a gift for sketching out his ideas in wonderful 3-D perspective and he was the author of many creative ideas for telescopes. He wrote many columns on amateur telescope making for Popular Astronomy and Scientific American magazines, and probably single-handedly sparked the revolution in this hobby in the 1920s. He also started the Stellafane convention in Springfield Vermont, a legendary yearly star party whose tradition continues to this day.Porter's talents soon came to the attention of George Ellery Hale, who was then putting together a team to design and build the 200 inch telescope. Hale offered Porter a job designing the mount for the beast and setting up and heading the instrument shops. Porter's contributions to the construction of the 200 inch were astounding, given that his only experience with telescopes was making amateur instruments of modest aperture. Porter's sketches and drawings in the design phase of the project are themselves legendary. It was frequently said that his drawings were referred to by the builders almost as much as the schematic plans. Many of Porter's original drawings are permanently housed at a Carnegie exhibit in Washington DC, and have won the acclaim of artists as well as astronomers.Some of Porter's other exploits included working with some partners during W.W.II to construct badly needed room prisms for military applications (tank periscopes, primarily). Porter and the others convinced the army that amateur telescope makers were uniquely skilled to grind these prisms to the exacting tolerances required by the military.This volume is lavishly illustrated with vintage black and white photos and dozens of Porter's drawings. Willard writes with the flare and vividness of a personal friend, though he claims never to have met the man. Porter comes across as a gentle, sincere man, who was always willing to take the time to show others a technique, or inspect a telescope constructed by an amateur.This book is extremely charming and a wonderfully sketched portrait of a great man.