Zero Genie

Edwin Hubble revolutionized astronomy in 1923 when he discovered that the “Andromeda Nebula” was actually a distant island galaxy full of stars, gas, and dust. That breakthrough helped set the cosmic distance scale and the overall nature of the cosmos. But fewer astronomy enthusiasts know that a decade before Hubble’s discovery, a little-known astronomer at Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona, discovered the expanding universe.

Indiana youth

Vesto Melvin Slipher was born on a farm in Mulberry, Indiana, on November 11, 1875. Invariably known as “V.M. Slipher,” he had an unspectacular childhood in the American Midwest, with few details of his youth ever recorded. Certainly growing up on a farm kept Slipher in robust shape. Many years later, astronomers remarked on his ability to climb mountain peaks, staying well ahead of those who were much younger. Slipher had a brother, eight years his junior, Earl C. Slipher, who would also grow up to be an astronomer and work at Lowell Observatory.

But during Slipher’s youth, this was all a distant future dream. Slipher graduated from high school, taught briefly at a country school, and then enrolled at Indiana University in Bloomington. One of his professors was Wilbur Cogshall, who had worked as an astronomer at Lowell in 1896 and 1897. Another professor was John Miller, an astronomer who later became director of Sproul Observatory in Pennsylvania. It was Miller who turned Slipher’s interests toward the heavens and Cogshall who introduced him to the idea of moving west to work at an observatory.