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Shapley argued that the spiral nebulae were small and in the Milky Way, while Curtis took a more radical position that they were independent galaxies, extremely large and distant.

Famed astronomer Edwin Hubble used this very telescope to solve the long-debated spiral nebulae question by observing other galaxies to be separate from our own.

And I’m thinking of the images of vaudevillian skeletons, and a weeping soldier, and spiral nebulae that have preoccupied the artist of late.

The entire underside of the dome looked like space as seen from the Hubble telescope: A dusty spiral nebula billowed up, a galaxy of stars twinkled, and meteorites whizzed across the ceiling.

Later that year, Payne won the inaugural Annie Jump Cannon Prize for contributions to astronomy, receiving $50 and a gold pin, designed by Cannon, in the form of a spiral nebula.