39. Commission Pour la Creation d’Observatoires Internationaux

Extract

At this time (March 15, 1948), it is possible to make only a preliminary report on the development of the project of International Astronomical Observatories. Excellent discussions of the proposals, in response to an outline by the President of the Commission, have been received from Dr Ira Bowen and Dr Walter Baade (of Mount Wilson and Palomar); Sir Harold Spencer Jones (Greenwich); Dr R. O. Redman (Cambridge, England); Dr Otto Struve (Yerkes and McDonald); Dr Bertil Lindblad (Stockholm); Dr Enrique Gaviola (Córdoba); Dr M. Waldmeier (Zürich); Dr G. A. Shajn (Simeis); Dr Joseph Witkowski (Poznań); Dr B. Lyot (Paris). At my request Dr J. S. Paraskevopoulos, Superintendent of the Harvard South African Station, has reported on South African sites. All these reports should eventually be printed or at least fully summarized and mimeographed for the use of the International Astronomical Union. Of special value are Lyot’s consideration of atmospheric conditions; the arguments of Bowen, Baade, Spencer Jones, and others in favour of a modest beginning with provision for growth when needs and directions are clearer, and Witkowski’s reconsideration of our earlier plan for an International Observatory and Laboratories in southern Europe.