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Career

Howard Grubb's greatest achievement was, firstly, the joint-construction with his father, Thomas Grubb, the Great Melbourne telescope. The other was the 27” telescope, years later, which can be found in the K&K Observatory, Vienna.

48" Melbourne reflector

The great equatorial telescope for Melbourned. Wellcome M0009423

In Howard's third year at Trinity College, he left his education and joined the family business in 1866 to assist his father in the construction of a 48” equatorially mounted reflector in Melbourne, Australia. Construction was completed in Dublin, 1868 and was then transported to Melbourne, where it went into operation in August 1869. Thomas Grubb retired from the firm in 1869, where Howard Grubb subsequently took over. Howard received assistance from the physicist, G.G. Stokes who was the Secretary of the Royal Society of London by offering guidance on challenging optical queries. Stokes used his influence to convince the Royal Society to finance the lending of a 15” Grubb refractor to William Higgins. Higgins was the ground-breaker of spectral analysis in England at the time. The success of lending the refractor influenced the demand for Howard to construct a 24” reflector for the Royal Observatory in Edinburgh, 1872.

27" Telescope

Howard won the bid to commence construction of a 27” telescope to be operated in the Royal and Imperial K&K Observatory in Vienna. The scale of such a project lead to the ‘Optical and Mechanical Works’ factory being established in Rathmines. At one point, it was the largest telescope the world had ever seen, the refractor along with seven 13” photographic telescopes for the Carte du Ciel projected a map of the heavens.

War Time

By 1900, the Grubb Firm became predominantly focused on designing and manufacturing periscopes for submarines, as there was a heavy emphasis being placed on naval combat by the Royal Navy. At the same time, the firm still continued to manufacture telescopes, notably a 26.5” for Johannesburg, SA. This telescope was far more technical and modern than previous ones constructed, with the first implementation of ball bearings. As fears grew over damage to the supply chain with German submarines patrolling the Irish Sea, Howard made the decision to relocate the factory from Rathmines to England. By the time they had relocated the war had already ended.

Later Career

During post-war depression, the demand for telescopes fell drastically, which lead to the Firm becoming liquidated. Sir Charles Parsons injected capital into the firm to keep it afloat. By now the firm had been renamed Grubb-Parsons, and went on to construct several more telescopes, with the ultimate being the 4.2m in diameter, William Herschel Telescope, which was inaugurated in 1987. Howard left the Firm, having been taken over by Parsons. Howard Grubb’s son, Romney, remained for a period before being pushed out. The Firm shut down production in 1985, after over 150 years in business.