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Concept
Timeline of Jodrell Bank Observatory
Summary
This is a timeline of Jodrell Bank Observatory.
1939 — Jodrell Bank site purchased by the University of Manchester as a botany field station.
1945, December — Bernard Lovell arrives at Jodrell Bank with several trailers of radar equipment from World War II.
1947 — The 66 meter Transit Telescope is constructed.
1950, August — The transit telescope is used to make the first detection of radio waves from the nearby Andromeda Galaxy.
1950 — Charles Husband presents first drawings of the proposed giant, fully steerable radio telescope.
1952, September — Construction of the Mark I telescope begins.
1957, October — The Mark I telescope becomes operational. It tracks the carrier rocket of Sputnik 1; the only telescope in the West able to do so.
1960, May — Lord Nuffield pays the remaining debt on the Mark I and the observatory is renamed the Nuffield Radio Astronomy Laboratories.
1962 — As part of a radio-linked interferometer, the Mark I identifies a new class of compact radio sources, later recognised as quasars.
1962 — Jodrell Bank radio telescope is mentioned in the science fiction novel A for Andromeda by Fred Hoyle and John Elliot.
1964 — The Mark II telescope is completed.
1966 — The Mark I receives pictures from Luna 9, the first spacecraft to make a soft landing on the Moon.
1966 — The Mark III telescope is completed.
1968 — The Mark I confirms the existence of pulsars.
1968 — The Mark I took part in the first transatlantic VLBI experiment in 1968, with other telescopes being those at Algonquin and Penticton in Canada.
1969 — The Mark I is used for the first time in a VLBI observation, with the Arecibo radio telescope in 1969.
1970–1971 — The Mark I is repaired and upgraded; it is renamed to the Mark IA.
1972–1973 — The Mark I carries out a survey of radio sources; amongst these sources was the first gravitational lens, which was confirmed optically in 1979.
1976, January — storms bring winds of around 90 mph which almost destroy the telescope. Bracing girders are added.
1980 — The Mark IA is used as part of the new MERLIN array.
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