Timeline of Jodrell Bank Observatory

1930s

• 1939 — Jodrell Bank site purchased by the University of Manchester as a botany field station.

1940s

• 1945, December — Bernard Lovell arrives at Jodrell Bank with several trailers of radar equipment from World War II.
• 1947 — The 66 m Transit Telescope is constructed.

1950s

• 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.Lovell, Story of Jodrell Bank, p. 35
• 1952, September — Construction of the Mark I telescope begins.Lovell, Story of Jodrell Bank, p. 44
• 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.Lovell, Story of Jodrell Bank, p.......
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