Palomar Observatory
National Geographic Society - Palomar Observatory Sky Survey (NGS-POSS) photographs, 1954-1977 (bulk 1954-1960).
This collection consists of photographs from the National Geographic Society Palomar Observatory Sky Survey (NGS-POSS). From 1948 to 1958 astronomers at the California Institute of Technology's Palomar Observatory used a 48-inch Schmidt Telescope to create this sky survey, at the time the most advanced sky survey ever. The survey detected objects of a magnitude of +22, one million times fainter than the limits of human vision. The NGS-POSS collection of photographic negative prints was published multiple times through the 1950s-1970s and scanned into the Digitized Sky Survey in the 1990s. The collection includes a set of prints measuring 14x17" from the photograph atlas, as well as a written survey guide and catalog of plates.
Located in San Diego County, California, it is owned and operated by the California Institute of Technology (Caltech). The 200-inch Hale reflecting telescope is the principal instrument at the Palomar Observatory and was built by Caltech with a 6 million dollar grant from the Rockefeller Foundation.
Palomar Observatory
Astronomy
Palomar Sky Survey.
Photographs. aat
National Geographic Society (U.S.)
AIP-ICOS
University of California, Irvine. University Libraries. Dept. of Special Collections. P.O. Box 19557, Irvine, CA 92623-9557, USA