$6-1/2 million endowment of General Education Fund of Rockefeller Institute. 2,040 acres. 5,500-foot altitude. 137-foot diameter revolving dome, weight 1,000 ton. 200-inch telescope tube, 60-foot long, weight 150 ton. 200-inch Pyrex mirror, weight 15 ton, 2-foot thick at edge. 500 ton weight of whole mounting. 20-foot diameter dome, housing 18-inch telescope. 45-foot diameter dome, housing 48-inch telescope. Museum for display of astronomical views. Cottages for maintenance families. 200-inch mirror brought up November 17, 1947. First test picture taken December 23, 1947. Light travels 186,000 miles per second. About 6 trillion miles equals 1 light year. 200-inch telescope looks out 1 billion light years. Chapter I FROM EARTH TO THE MOON Ever since man has been upon the Earth he has observed the stars in the heavens and wondered about them. As he watched their movement across the heavens night after night, his curiosity has been awakened and he has wondered just what these diamonds in the sky were made of and what they were like. As his curiosity has grown, man has worked constantly seeking an answer to these questions of his mind. Thus he has developed the telescope from its first crude beginning to the present large two hundred inch in the Hale Observatory on Mount Palomar. Hand in hand with the developing of the telescope for the past quarter of a century has gone the development of the airplane, and with it the ever mounting hope in man's heart that soon he will be able to make a trip to his nearest neighbor in the sky, the Moon. This in spite of the fact that for centuries man on Earth has been taught that there is no atmosphere on the Moon. Yet as the telescopes had been developed to greater and greater size and perfection, storms had been observed around the Moon. Also from time to time a state of what scientists called atmospheric movements had been noted. Thus even when our plans for making this trip were first being worked out, we were of the firm conviction that the Moon did have atmosphere of some kind. What we did not know was; what is the consistency of the Moon's atmosphere? We were sure that it contains a certain amount of oxygen, for as Dr. Johnston said, "even if the Moon is all rock, rock in itself contains and gives off oxygen." Also we knew that there couldn't be any kind of atmosphere anywhere without it containing oxygen. Therefore, since the Moon had rock in it and since we had seen storms around it, there was no question in our minds as to whether oxygen was there. The question was concerning its quantity; was there a sufficient amount to supply the needs of Earth men like us?