Harold A. McAlister
All photographs and text presented herein are copyrighted by the author and may not be reproduced in any form without his permission.
Karel Hujer was born on September 18, 1902, in Zelezny Brod, Czechoslovakia to a horticultural family that gave him a comfortable living and an excellent education. He was a youngster during the apparition of Halley's Comet and the other lesser known but spectacular Great Comet of 1910. Fascinated by astronomy from that experience at an early age, Karel prepared for a future in his destined field by studying mathematics and physics, ultimately obtaining his doctorate in natural sciences at Prague's ancient Charles University. Along this path, he also studied at University College, London and the Yerkes Observatory of the University of Chicago. His academic career included positions at several colleges before finally settling in at the University of Chattanooga, later the University of Tennesse at Chattanooga, in 1946. He retired from UTC in 1973 as Guerry Professor Emeritus of Astronomy.
Karel's remarkable life story is more completely explored in a separate onlline memorial tribute to him. Throughout his life, travel was a critically important component of Karel's academic and personal spiritual endeavoers. In this series, we focus on the extensive collection of photographic imagery he accumulated over the various extensive trips he took in support of his academic and personal spiritual endeavors.
Background to this Project
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This present project results from a collaboration with Tor N.G. Westin, my brother-in-law and fellow astronomer. Tor expertly scanned some 3400 35-mm negatives at 3200 ppi, carefully labeling them with filenames consistent with Karel's own scrupulous notation of his slides and negatives. I then made a first pass through them to select what I thought are the most interesting and attempted to collate them in terms of place and time by inspecting Karel's journals. For many of the images, some Internet time spent following clues (names of streets, hotels, shops, etc.) led to more specific descriptions included in the captions. Finally, Tor and I sat down to pick the final collection of images presented here.
The photographs herein have been rescaled to 1200x760 pixels at 100 ppi for better viewing on computer screens. There has also be some adjustment to contrast and clean up of dust and scratches made using Photoshop Elements 10 to these versions of the original untouched scans.
All of these images are copyrighted by H.A. McAlister and are subject to all copyright restrictions.
Karel Hujer was a Czech patriot who spent much of his later years writing and speaking against the Soviet stranglehold over his native land. On the very first page of the journal he started in order to record memories of his long upcoming trip is pasted a montage comprised of a Czech flag, an outline map of his country, and a photo of its first president Tomáš Garrigue Maseryk. Thomas Maseryk, born in 1850, was an activist for Czech independence from Austria-Hungary and a leader in the freedom movement that achieved this goal following WWI. He served as the nation's first president from 1918 until late 1935 when he retired due to his advancing age. He was among the first European leaders to warn of the threat of Hitler's rise to power. He passed away on September 15, 1937 - a year prior to the Munich Agreement giving Hitler the green light to occupy Czechoslovakia.
Maseryk's September 21st funeral lasted nine hours, and hundreds of thousands lined the path of his horse-drawn caisson through historic Prague. When I first saw the following set of photographs, it was clear this was a major event, but it took only a little digging to reveal that Karel had witnessed the funeral procession and took these wonderful and historic photos.
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□□□□ A crowd awaiting the procession lines the 14th century Charles Bridge crossing the Vltava River. On the hill in the distance is the large Prague Castle complex at the center of which is St. Vitus Cathedral for which construction began in 1344.
□□□□ The body of the first Czech President, resting enshrouded on a field howitzer caisson, is drawn by horses through the streets of Prague as seen by this photo likely taken from a second storey window. From a street sign between the two windows at lower left, we can see that this is along Parizska Street, which is today a very fashionable shopping district in Old Town Prague.
□□□□ The Rudolfinum is a building in central Prague that housed the Czech parliament from 1919 to 1939 when it was dissolved by the Nazis. In 1946, it became the home of the Czech Philarmonic Orchestra. Betwen the Rudolfinum and Parizska Street is the Old Jewish Cemetery.
□□□□ A flyover by the Czech Air Force honors former President Maseryk. Zooming in on this image shows that these are biplanes and most likely Czech Avia B-534 fighters.
Karel began his long journey in late October 1937 with a visit to Madame Gabrielle Flammarion, widow of the famous French popularizer of astronomy Camille Flammarion, at the Observatory in the Paris suburb of Juvisy established by her husband in 1883. Hers was the first inscription in his travel journal wherein she wrote, “From Juvisy on the way to Mount Palomar, with the truth of the old science, Gabrielle Camille Flammarion.” I have a lengthy letter from her to Karel ten years prior to this visit in which she tries to convince him to come work at her Observatory as its principal observer. This was only two years after her husband’s death, and she would keep the facility operational for decades. Karel declined the offer as he wanted to finish his two-year, post-graduate appointment at the preeminent Yerkes Observatory of the University of Chicago, return to Prague to complete his doctoral studies, and then set off to see the world! He maintained his friendship with Mdm. Flammarion until she passed away in 1962.
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□□□□ Juvisy-sur-Orge, France, October 17, 1937 — The Camille Flammarion Observatory at Juvisy. Situated about a mile south of the Paris-Orly airport and maintained by municipality of Juvisy, the Observatory is today open for visits and public viewing.
□□□□ Juvisy-sur-Orge, France, October 17, 1937 — Karel being greeted by Madame Flammarion at the entrance to her then private observatory with it excellent 9.5-inch refractor.
□□□□ Juvisy-sur-Orge, France, October 17, 1937 — Mdm. Flammarion, second from right and caught in mid-blink, hosts a gathering on a lovely fall day overlooking the garden behind the Camille Flammarion Observatory.
□□□□ Paris, France, ca. October 20, 1937 — A street scene in an unknown part of Paris shows a small hotel - Hotel de la Jardiniere - possibly where Karel stayed during his week in the city.
The next stop on Karel's journey was a brief visit to England where he was particularly interested in participating in a meeting of the Friends of India Society held on October 26 at the Koh-I-Noor Restaurant on Rupert Street, Picadilly, London. The British Library has a 1937 advertisement in the Indian Student magazine that notes the restaurant had rooms for private parties. The Library description states that the Koh-I-Noor and its sister restaurant in Cambridge were "popular with returned civil servants who had worked as administrators in India." A journal inscription by a person named F. Mary Barr that noted the place of the meeting recorded: "On my way out to India again, I am happy to meet Dr. Hujer whom I first saw in Delhi talking with Mahatma Gandhi and glad to fee that we are both trying to serve and follow Gandhiji each in our own sphere." I plan to have a selection of photographs from Karel's 1935 visit to Gandhi's ashram in Wardha in another installment from his travels.
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□□□□ Unknown French port, October 25, 1937 — Crossing the English Channel for a short stay in London before embarking for the U.S. on the Duchess of Bedford, a Canadian Pacific steamship bound for Quebec and Montreal.
□□□□ Westminster, London — A crowd exiting the Great West Door of Westminster Abbey. King George VI opened Parliament, his first such act after becoming King, on 26 Oct 1937. That ceremony involves a service at Westminster, and it is possible that Karel captured in thie images members of Parliament exiting the church after the service to reconvene in the adjacent Palace of Westminster.
□□□□ Whitehall, London — The Cenotaph War Memorial.
□□□□ London — Oxford Circus and Regent Street London.
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□□□□ Boston's Old State House. Note the lion and unicorn statues at the top of the structure. Representing the United Kingdom, of which Massachusetts was a part at the building's construction, they respectively stand for England and Scotland. The statues were removed for renovation in 2014. During that process, a time capsule from 1901 was found in the lion's head, and it was replaced by successor when reinstalled in 2014.
□□□□ Traffic on Tremont Street alongside Boston Common after passing by the 1810 Park Street Congregational Church whose steeple was once the tallest building in America.
□□□□ Green Street MBTA station at Jamaica Plain.
□□□□ Off to NYC on a Greyhound coach manufactred in 1937 by the Yellow Coach Manufacturing Company.
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□□□□ Driver welcoming passengers on the New York-bound bus.
□□□□ The Greyhound bus station and Post House at Green Farms, Connecticut, a suburb of Westport was a way station en route on the Post Road from Boston to New York. Today, I-95 runs through Green Farms. A contemporary postcard shows the spacious and welcoming facility.
□□□□ Eye contact on the subway.
□□□□ Lower Manhattan skyline with the 67-storey Cities Service Building - now a luxury rental property. Prior to construction of the World Trade Center, it was the tallest building in Lower Manhattan. The building was only seven years old in this photograph and third in stature to the Empire State and Chrysler buildings at that time.
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□□□□ This appears to be a view looking south down 3rd Aveune just north of 59th. You can see the sign at 58th Street advertising the grand old the RKO Proctor Theater. The Life of Emile Zola won the Oscar that year. The tall building in the mid-distance is the 50-storey General Electric Building, built in 1933. It is now known as the 570 Lexington Avenue Building.
□□□□ Taxi line on Broadway at Wall St with Trinity Episcopal Church on the left and the Woolworth Building in the distance.
□□□□ Mounted policeman at Bowery Savings Bank.
□□□□ Ever-watchful New York City cops.
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□□□□ Evanston, IL, early January 1938 — The Dearborn Observatory of Northwestern University was built in 1864 to house an 18.5-inch refractor whose lens was originally ordered from the famous firm of Alvan Clark & Sons of Cambridgeport, MA. The outbreak of the Civil Was led the firm to cancel the order and resell the lens to interested parties in Chicago who built this observatory to house the telescope. It was then one of the largest in the world. The building is today completely surrounded by University facilities.
□□□□ Omaha, NE, February 17, 1938 — The corner of 16th and Jackson Street shows the Aquila Court Building, a 1924 structure housing offices, retail stores, and apartments. It is now the Magnolia Hotel. Closer to Karel's camera was the Hotel Hill, built in 1919, where a trio called the Jack Kurtze Rollickers was performing. A portion of the hotel now remains as a residential building called the Kensington Tower.
□□□□ Omaha, NE, February 17, 1938 — On the opposite corner from the previous photo were the Union Bus Depot and Beaton Drug Co. A postcard shows a wider view of the depot and drug store. The Union Terminal eventually was expanded and taken over by Greyhound. Beaton Drug Co. was established in 1898, became a regional chain, and much later was sold to Albertsons.
□□□□ Cheyenne, WY, ca. February 20, 1938 — A view down Capitol Avenue in Cheyenne shows the Paramount Theater, the Capitol Hotel, and O. P. Skaggs Grocery Store. The partially seen car in the lower right of the image is parked at the bus depot lot, which can be seen in a wider view of this corner in a vintage postcard
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□□□□ En route to Flagstaff, AZ, ca. February 23, 1938 — A rest stop on the Albuquerque bus before continuing on to Flagstaff, Arizona.
□□□□ Santa Fe, New Mexico, ca. February 23, 1938 — The El Fidel Hotel on the corner of Galisteo and Water Streets in Santa Fe and the building across the street from it still stand today, although the hotel is no longer there.
□□□□ Santa Fe, New Mexico, ca. February 23, 1938 — A block down water street to the corner of Don Gaspar Avenue, Karel photographed the K. C. Waffle House. One can find an interior view of this establishment on the Internet. It looks like an early stage in the evolution towards today's chain of Waffle Houses originally founded in Avondale Estates, Georgia. This quaint building is at this writing Cafe Pasqual's. They do not have waffles on their otherwise great looking menu.
□□□□ Flagstaff, AZ, February 23, 1938 — Looking down Aspen Avenue one sees the Weatherford Hotel, built in 1900 still in operation with several eating and drinking options in the building. In the foreground are the Babbvitt drug and thrift stores. The Babbitt family has long been prominet in Flagstaff, culminating with Bruce Babbitt's poliical career as Secretary of State and then Governor of Arizona and Secretary of the Interior in the Clinton Administration. Karel spent some time in Flagstaff because of the presence there of the Lowell Observatory, established in 1894 by Percival Lowell (1855-1915) who was fascinated by a belief in life on Mars and the reality of its "canals." This wonderful and still very prominent institution is famous for the discovery of Pluto by astronomer Clyde Tombaugh (1906-1997). If you look carefully down Aspen in the enlarged image, you will see a square-topped structure on top of the hill. That promintory is Mars Hill, home of the Observatory, and the structure is the enclosure of the 24-inch refracting telescope. Today, Lowell Observatory continues its strong research program in astronomy and also has an extensive educatoni and outreach program that provides evening access to its telescopes, including the 24 inch.
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□□□□ Lowell Observatory, Flagstaff, AZ, February 23, 1938 — Karel visited Lowell Observatory on this day, and we see the entrance to the Observatory grounds on the road up Mars Hill from Flagstaff. Lowell astronomers signing his journal on that visit were Observatory Director Vesto M. Slipher, his brother Earl C. Slipher, who had in earlier years served as Mayor of Flagstaff, Pluto discoverer Clyde W. Tombaugh, Carl Lampland, Henry Giclas, and Arthur Adel. The next day, he visited the Arizona State Teachers College (now Northern Arizona University), the museum of Northern Arizona. There were no other journal entries until March 5 when he was in Los Angeles.
□□□□ Lowell Observatory, Flagstaff, AZ, February 23, 1938 — While visiting the tomb of Percival Lowell, Karel wrote some lines from Lowell's book The Evolution of Worlds.
□□□□ Lowell Observatory, Flagstaff, AZ, February 23, 1938 — Here we see the enclosure of the 24-inch telescope.
□□□□ Lowell Observatory, Flagstaff, AZ, February 23, 1938 — This is the 13-inch astrograph camera used by Clyde Tombaugh to search for Planet X that resulted in his discovery of Pluto from photographic plates obtained in January 1930.
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□□□□ Lowell Observatory, Flagstaff, AZ, February 23, 1938 — When I first saw this photo, I thought this had to be Tombaugh posing beside his Pluto discovery astrograph. But, I had never seen a photo of him in which he had a mustache. So, I sent an inquiry to Lowell Director Jeff Hall who forwarded the photo to Kevin Schindler, the Observatory Historian. He confirmed that this is indeed Clyde during a mustache phase of his life.
□□□□ Flagstaff, AZ, February 23, 1938 — A Native American dishwasher looks up when Karel disturbed his work.
□□□□ En route to Los Angeles, ca. March 5, 1938 — The bus is stopped in terrain that indicates it is well out of the Northern Arizona high country. Karel's journal jumps from February 24 to March 5, which is the first entry for LA wherein acclaimed Czech violinist Jan Kubelik incribed a short musical score and signed it with a flourish.
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□□□□ The Mountain View Inn was one of Hollywood's great old hotels. Located at 5956 Hollywood Blvd, the site is now a Toyota dealership with a Salvation Army store across the street.
□□□□ Travel trailer with wary dog and plants.
□□□□ Man having his shoes shined.
□□□□ In late winter 1938, Southern California received more than 4 inches of rain in just three days. This resulted in a 50-year flood that killed more than a hundred people. Karel visited Los Angeles while the flood waters were still receeding. This image shows water flowing in the streets still awash with mud and debris. In examining the image, one sees Griffith Observatory atop the hill above the right side of the filling station. This perspective indicates the action here was in the vicinity of US 101 and Franklin Avenue.
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□□□□ Across from Pershing Square and near the corner of Olive and Fifth in Los Angeles, a news vendor displays an issue full of flood photos in an extra edition. The Biltmore hotel, the largest in the US west of Chicago when it opened in 1923, is down West Fifth Street from this crowded scene.
□□□□ A palm-lined avenue in LA.
□□□□ On the way to Mount Palomar where construction on the Hale 200-inch telescope was still in progress.
□□□□ The great dome of the 200-inch telescope under construction.
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□□□□ Another view of the 200-inch telescope dome. Once completed, the entire building would be painted white so as to reflect solar radiation in an effort to keep the interior cool.
□□□□ Scenes inside the 200-inch dome. Karel would return a decade later to attend the telescope's dedication.
□□□□ An unknown man and his dog at the Palomar construction site.
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□□□□ The administration and operations building for Mount Palomar Observatory.
□□□□ Highway scenes returning to LA.
□□□□ Pasadena, California, June 10, 1938 — The procession of faculty for the 1938 commencement of the California Institute of Technology is lined up prior to the event. The speaker was Edwin Hubble on "Experiment and Experience." The Big T, Caltech's yearbook, featured the construction of the 200-inch telescope.
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□□□□ Pasadena, California, June 10, 1938 — An unknown Caltech faculty member greeting a guest at commencement.
□□□□ A poster advertises a pro-Czech, anti-Nazi program of which Karel is a primary speaker. The event on April 20, 1938 took place eleven months before Hitler invaded Czechoslovakia on March 15, 1939.
□□□□ Karel poses with that poster.
□□□□ The inscription over the entrance to the Santa Barbara County courthouse translates as God gave us the country, the skill of man hath built the town.
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□□□□ Los Angeles, early March, 1938 — Karel with an unknown companion enjoying the view from Griffith Observatory.
□□□□ Los Angeles, early March, 1938 — Two scenes from visits to unknown LA neighborhoods.
□□□□ Los Angeles, early March, 1938 — A rest station along the trail up Mount Wilson from Sierra Madre.
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□□□□ Mount Wilson, early March, 1938 — The 150-ft Solar Tower Telescope collects sunlight high above the ground to avoid turbulent and blurring air to relay it to instruments far below. This historic instrument was commissioned in 1910.
□□□□ Mount Wilson, early March, 1938 — Views of the 100-inch telescope through the trees and from across the footbridge connecting it across a small arroyo to the 60-inch telescope as well as to the Galley where observers take their middle of the night meal, referred to as "night lunch."
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□□□□ Mount Wilson, early March, 1938 — The drooping limbs of a dead bigcone Douglas-fir silhouette against the dome of the 100-inch reflecting telescope, then the world's largest. Note that the dome shutters are open and facing away from the viewer, probably to provide interior light to workers that day. The house by the dome was torn down in the 1960s for a replacment house that is still in use. The tree in front of the 100-inch dome is another bigcone Doug-fir, which still stands. Its top was clipped off in 1963 when a small private airplane went through it while crashing on the mountain, killing the pilot, and narrowly missing the telescope dome. The grove of ponderosa pines to the right of the fir are also still standing.
□□□□ San Diego, ca. March 19, 1938 — The famous Hotel del Coronado sits across the bay from San Diego. When it opened in 1888, it was the world's second largest resort hotel and remains the second largest wooden structure in the U.S. Sixteen American presidents have stayed there.
□□□□ Los Angeles, June 10, 1938 — Two hotels, the Biltmore and the San Carlos, are on the right in this image looking down 5th Street. The San Carlos Hotel, whose slogan was "Where you feel at home," was a less expensive alternative to the Biltmore. The crowd of pedestrians waw likely mostly comprised of Shriners in town for their national convention during June 7-9, 1938.
□□□□ Los Angeles, June 10, 1938 — The grand Buick Phaeton convertible of Walter Smith Sugden, "Imperial Potentate of the Shrine," is parked at the side entrance to the Biltmore Hotel's Coffee Shop and Date Shop located on the corner of Fifth and Grand across from Pershing Square. The July 8, 1938 edition of The New York Times reported that Mr. Sugden died at age 58 from a cerebral hemorrhage just a few weeks after he had presided at the Shriners Convention in Los Angeles.
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□□ Off to Peru, July 13, 1938 — A fellow passenger took this photo of Karel on board the Bokuyo Maru as it departed from Los Angeles for a two-month visit to Peru.
□□ En route to the port of Callao, Peru — The small Japanese ocean liner Bokuyo Maru sits at anchor at an unknown port of call. Almost exactly a year later, as the ship was returning to Japan from Chile, explosives being carried as freight exploded and the ship sank within half an hour. Miraculously, all of the 110 crew and 102 passengers were saved. Karel would return from his lengthy Peruvian visit on the Rakuyo Maru on September 24, 1938. In September 1944, the Rakuyo Maru was among a convey of Japanese ships caught unawares and attacked by a U.S. Navy submarine wolfpack, and the Rakuyo Maru was sunk by torpedos. Tragically, and unknown to the American attackers, the ship was carrying more than 2,200 British and Australian POWs who were being transported from Burma to Japan as slave laborers. The majority of these soldiers died including some who made it to lifeboats but were killed by Japanese sailers after the attack.
While Karel was aboard the Rakuyo Maru, the infamous Munich Pact was being implemented, and a major fraction of his Czech homeland would be annexed by Hitler's Germany within weeks. Hitler invaded the rest of Czechoslovakia the following spring. Karel was admitted to the U.S. for a period of one year under Sec. 3 (2) of the Immigration Act of 1924. He would live in the United States for the rest of his life.
