Part 3

F. W. Preston and William J. McGrath, Jr.

Although John Peate was born when Holcomb was only 33, and before that pioneer telescope-maker had produced his first instrument, he lived well into the time when American telescope-making had come of age. Before Peate’s death George Ellery Hale had begun his career as a promoter of large telescopes; indeed, the Yerkes 40-inch refractor was completed a year prior to Peate’s delivery of his own magnum opus, a 62-inch reflector, to The American University. For 34 years the University sought funds to finance the installation of this mirror, until it finally became obsolete as a result of advances in the technology of glass mirror making.

In 1934 it was sent by the American University to the Smithsonian Institution. About this time Dr. F. W. Preston undertook the difficult task of reconstructing Peate’s career and particularly the story of the great mirror. His results were published in the Bulletin of the American Ceramic Society in 1936.

With the gracious permission of Dr. Preston and the Bulletin, this article has been condensed, and augmented, for publication here by William J. McGrath, Jr., of the United States National Museum staff.

John Peate, bricklayer, Methodist minister, and amateur extraordinary in the art of telescope making, was the first born of Thomas and Mary Peate. He was born on May 6, 1820, in the small northern Irish town of Drumskelt. When John was seven, his father, a mason, emigrated to Quebec, Canada, the first of several moves to cities in Canada and the United States, terminating in 1836 in Buffalo, New York, where the father was to spend the last seven years of his life.

Nothing is known of the circumstances of John’s life during these early years, nor of his education. In 1836, at the age of 16, he entered his father’s trade as an apprentice bricklayer. He worked at this trade for about sixteen years, apparently intermittently, for he seems to have been a student at Oberlin College part of the time between 1842 and 1845. In the latter year he married Mary Elizabeth Tilden of Buffalo.

Peate’s career as a bricklayer ended in 1851, when he became a full-time minister, having been converted to his mother’s religion. This came about in consequence of his attendance, when he was about 20 years old, at a Methodist revival. There he was “converted,” and, with characteristic energy and enthusiasm, plunged into his new religion. His attendance at Oberlin may have been connected with his preparation for the ministry. In any case, he started to preach in 1849, on trial with the Methodist Erie Conference, was ordained a deacon in 1851, and an elder two years later. From this time until he was made a supernumerary in 1894 he worked full-time as a minister.

The mobility which marked his early life was repeated in his ministerial career. Including his probationary term he held 19 different appointments in 14 cities and towns in northwestern Pennsylvania, northeastern Ohio, and southwestern New York. He was a successful and popular minister, and is said to have converted some 500 persons at one revival in Jamestown, New York. J. N. Fradenburgh, historian of the Erie Conference, begins his sketch of Peate’s life with the phrase, “Who has not heard of John Peate?”

In 1859 Peate journeyed to Europe, visiting England and Ireland, and making a walking tour of western Europe and the Middle East. His biographer Fradenburgh hints that his interest in astronomy was aroused on this trip. In any event, upon his return home, he took up the study of the science. His fellow minister, R. N. Stubbs reported that “his library reveals that difficult and abstruse works became his delight.” At some point in the perusal of these “abstruse works,” Peate decided to concentrate on that basic tool, the telescope. It is possible that he first made a telescope, as many amateurs do, to advance himself in the study of astronomy, and only after completing it realized that his primary interest lay in the instruments rather than in the theoretical science. His natural aptitude for craftsmanship probably exerted a strong influence in this decision.

His first instrument was a 3-inch refractor which he made and mounted for his own use. This was about 1870. He next made either a 6-inch refractor or a 6-inch reflector, or perhaps both. One of these, if there were two, was mounted by Peate for use at Chautauqua and Jamestown, New York, and then used in his own observatory at Greenville. After his death it was taken to Salina, Kansas, by W. F. Hoyt, for a small observatory there.

Thereafter Peate made reflectors exclusively. It is possible that he was influenced by the treatise on the making of silvered glass reflectors, by Dr. Henry Draper, published by the Smithsonian Institution in 1865, a work which led to a great improvement in the construction of reflectors in this country.

Attempts to trace Peate’s mirrors have been singularly inconclusive. A 7-inch reflector sent to India was still in use in 1903. A 12-inch reflector made for “Harriman University, Tennessee,” was evidently mounted, but no record even of the observatory has been found at the present time . A 15-inch mirror in a reflector located at Allegheny College in 1935 was probably made by Peate, although the College records do not show its origin, nor do they mention a 30.5-inch mirror which Peate was making for Allegheny College in 1891, according to an article in The Scientific American. Definitely Peate’s was a 22-inch reflector found in about 1935, still in its packing case, at Thiel College, Greenville, Pennsylvania.

Altogether, 10 lenses and mirrors (sometimes also described as “lenses”) have been traced. As many as 20 were ascribed to him by some sources at the time of his death. Of these only his magnum opus, the 62-inch mirror now in the Smithsonian Institution, can now be found. Most of them seem never to have been used, but this is not necessarily an indication of defects in the instruments. As our consideration of the 62-inch mirror will show, Peate was a competent maker. Nor is it a consequence of his being an amateur. Many of the large telescopes in the world in the mid-nineties had lenses and mirrors made by two other Americans, John Brashear and Alvin Clark, who, like Peate, entered telescope making as amateurs. But they had the fortune to become associated with well known professional astronomers. Peate may have erred in presenting his reflectors to institutions unable to finance their installation. Perhaps his error was in presenting rather than selling them.

We come now to Dr. Peate’s greatest mirror, the 62-inch reflector. In September 1893 the annual meeting of the Erie Conference was held at Dubois, Pennsylvania. This was to be Dr. Peate’s last meeting as an active minister. In 1894 he would become a supernumerary, a position of semiretirement, after which he would retire. In order to honor the old minister and to mark the opening of a new Methodist university, American University, at Washington, D.C., it was decided to commission Peate to make a telescope mirror for the school. This was to be no ordinary reflector but the largest in the world.

While the facts surrounding this commission and its accomplishment are astounding in themselves it has inspired an even more remarkable legend, which, although rather unjust to the ability and good sense of Dr. Peate, indicates the impression his hobby had made on his contemporaries. According to this legend, John suddenly realized at the age of seventy-three that he must have something to occupy his time while retired.

“What am I to do all the rest of my life?” he asked of the presiding officer of the meeting, Bishop Hurst, who was also chancellor of the newly founded University.

“Oh, study astronomy,” said the Bishop.

“Make a big telescope lens,” said Dr. Wythe.

Dr. Wythe, whose doctorate was in medicine, was a minister well known in the conference as an inventor and technologist. The legend continues that, urged on by Wythe, Peate announced to the conference, “I will make for the new University the largest telescope lens in the world, if you will defray the out of pocket expenses.”

“Well, how big a lens can you make?” asked the Bishop.

“Oh, as big as that chart on the wall,” said Peate.

“Get a rule and measure the chart.”

The chart was 62 inches across.

“Offer accepted. One 62-inch reflecting telescope from Dr. Peate,” ordered the Bishop.

The minutes of the conference state:

Proposition of John Peate … John Peate made a proposition to manufacture a large reflecting lens for the University providing material for the same was furnished him … a committee of 5 was appointed to take the same into consideration. R. N. Stubbs, G. H. Humason, N. T. Arnold, G. P. Hukill, and G. B. Chase were appointed to that committee.

Although he was 73 years old Peate was in good health and had tremendous vitality for one his age. He had already made a number of large mirrors, so that he could estimate the amount of time and energy he would expend in this work. He knew that if he retained his health for the next few years he could complete it.

With his typical planned enthusiasm he started his preparations. He wrote to his usual supplier St. Gobain of France asking the price of a glass blank large enough for a mirror of this size. They quoted a price of $18,000—more, obviously, than he could afford. He then canvassed the glassmakers of Pittsburgh, the center of American glassmaking. However, the Pittsburgh firms had little experience in optical glass, especially of this size, and none would consider making the blank.