My wife and I were in Greenville, South Carolina, on August 17, 2024. As we drove along I-85 past Roper Mountain, I found myself thinking about the famous (1882) 23-inch refractor telescope that sits atop the mountain.
October 30, 1938 and the famous radio broadcast of the 1898 Novel “The War of the Worlds” by H.G. Wells:
This is the very telescope used by the “fictitious” Princeton astronomer Richard Pierson to observe the Martians approaching Grovers Mill, New Jersey, in The War of the Worlds, based on H.G. Wells’s 1898 novel. The famous 1938 radio broadcast was so convincingly presented that many listeners believed an actual Martian invasion was underway, reportedly sending thousands of people across the country into a panic!
Orson Welles “with his booming and dynamic voice”narrated the famous broadcast. Welles played the radio character of the Princeton Astronomer. This event brought world-wide fame to then 23-year-old Orson Welles. Roger Ivester
The following photo and information: Credit to the Roper Mountain Science Center, and the Charles E. Daniel Observatory:
As a Greenville County Schools facility, the Daniel Observatory is open to the public only during special events.
The Charles E. Daniel Observatory features a very historic 23-inch refractor telescope, the eighth largest of its kind in the nation. The Great Refractor was completed in 1882 for Princeton University and was the main instrument in their Halsted Observatory. The lens was figured by Alvan Clark and Sons of Cambridge, Massachusetts. In 1933, the telescope was entirely rebuilt by J. W. Fecker Company. The U.S. Naval Observatory owned the telescope from 1964 until 1978, when it was offered to the School District of Greenville County.
Funds provided by the Charles E. Daniel Family Foundation were used in renovating the telescope and in constructing the observatory building to house the telescope. The telescope is used to educate, to inspire, and to entertain visitors.
Commemorative Plaque in Grovers Mill, New Jersey.
Famous “fictitious landing site” of the Martians to commemorate “The War of the Worlds” radio broadcast on October 30th 1938.
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