Table of Contents

Introduction: Who is Edwin Hubble?.........................................pg 3

Chapter 1: Early Life......................................................................pg 4

Chapter 2: Hubble’s Jobs................................................................pg 7

Chapter 3: Contributions...............................................................pg 9

Chapter 4: Death and Legacy......................................................pg 12

Glossary............................................................................................pg 14

Introduction: Who is Edwin Hubble?

    Edwin Powell Hubble was an American astronomer that played a very important role in establishing the branches of extragalactic astronomy, or the astronomy dealing with objects outside of the Milky Way galaxy, and observational cosmology, or the study of the structure, evolution and origin of the universe through observation, using tools such as telescopes. 

    He changed the minds of many previous astronomers through proving that many objects previously thought to be clouds of dust and gas that were classified as "nebulae" were actually galaxies. He also observed the expansion of the universe happening continuously.

Chapter 1: Early Life

Edwin Powell Hubble was born on November 20, 1889 in the town of Marshfield, Missouri. He was born to Virginia Lee James and John Powell Hubble. 

    Edwin seemed to have succeeded easily through his studies at Wheaton High School in Chicago. His grades in English, Mathematics,

Edwin Hubble at a young age

Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Latin, and German were usually between 95 and 100, even though he spent more time playing sports than studying. He was encouraged by his father to work as a delivery boy during his vacations from school. When Edwin graduated from high school in 1906 at age 16, he earned a scholarship for the University of Chicago. 

In the fall of 1906, still at age 16,

Hubble enrolled at Chicago. He continued to spend lots of time playing sports, especially basketball, athletics, and boxing. Records show that on May 6, 1906 he set a new record for the high jump, which was 5 feet 8-and-a-half inches. In 1910, he graduated with a Bachelor’s of Science degree.

Hubble spent the next three years at the University of Oxford on a Rhodes scholarship. He was still interested about science, especially astronomy, but he studied Jurisprudence, or the theory of law. Hubble graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in 1912. He spent another year learning Spanish. 

Chapter 2: Hubble’s Jobs 

    Hubble returned to the United States in the summer of 1913, and he got a job teaching Spanish and Physics at New Albany High School, Indiana. He also trained the school basketball team and did German translation work. He was a very popular teacher, but he did not enjoy his job that much.

    At age 24, Hubble finally entered the field that had fascinated him since he first looked through his grandfather’s telescope; astronomy. He began a Ph.D. in Astronomy,  and graduated in 1917 with the theory Photographic Investigations of Faint Nebulae.

    World War I then occurred, and Hubble spent a year in the army and a year at the University of Cambridge doing astronomy research work.

    In 1919, at age 30, he began to work at Mount Wilson Observatory in California, known for its clear air and the very good viewing conditions. He would stay there for the rest of his life.

Mount Wilson Observatory 

Chapter 3: Contributions

Galaxies Beyond the Milky Way

In the early 1920s, using the huge Hooker Telescope, Hubble found Cepheid variable stars located in nebulae. He paid close attention to the Andromeda nebula, or the nebula the Cepheid variables were in, and discovered that the Cepheid variables inside the nebula are at very far distances from Earth, and much farther than the stars in the Milky Way.

Andromeda galaxy