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Celestron began in the 1950s
as Valor Electronics, an aerospace electronics firm. Celestron's
founder, Tom Johnson, became interested in telescopes and astronomy
when looking for a suitable telescope for his two young sons.
Tom decided to build a telescope from scratch. Starting with
a 6" reflector, he progressed to building increasingly larger
and more sophisticated designs. Tom's hobby soon grew into a
full-time business, offering Schmidt-Cassegrain telescopes in
4" to 22" models.
His immediate challenge was
to find a way to efficiently produce the Schmidt corrector plate
used in our top-of-the-line catadioptric telescopes. Although
a corrector plate appears flat, it actually has a "wavy"
surface that's difficult to mass-produce using standard equipment
and procedures. Making Schmidt correctors was an expensive and
time-consuming process.
In 1970 our designers and engineers
announced a revolutionary method of producing Schmidt-Cassegrain
telescopes at a reasonable cost and in volume. This optical breakthrough
was incorporated in the first Celestron C8. The popularity of
the C8 in the consumer marketplace led to the C5 and then to
larger versions including an 11" and 14" telescope.
The Celestron product line still features 5", 8", 11"
and 14" models but has been broadened to include a number
of refractors, reflectors and a complete line of binoculars and
spotting scopes.
Many people still remember Celestron
for its orange color C8's but many more are now familiar with
our other product offerings. Major colleges and universities
worldwide use our telescopes in their astronomy programs. Throughout
the world, Celestron telescopes have always been the "telescope
of choice". Our reputation is so good in the scientific
community that Celestron's C5 telescope has been chosen over
all competing models by NASA to be taken on several space shuttle
research missions.
Celestron has experienced tremendous
growth over the years. Incorporated in 1957 as Valor Electronics,
Tom Johnson sold the company in 1980 to Diethelm Ltd. In 1998
the Tasco Corporation, a leading optics company, purchased Celestron.
In June of 2002, three members of Celestron's senior management,
Joseph A. Lupica, Jr., Richard Hedrick and co-founder Alan Hale,
purchased the company, initiating a whole new era for Celestron.
Under the new management, the company plans to expand distribution
channels and product offerings to better serve our customers.
We are proud of our over 40
years of history as Celestron. We continue to manufacture approximately
half of the products we distribute in our Torrance, California
(a suburb of Los Angeles) headquarters. We emphasize the attention
to detail that goes into each of our products and the strict
quality control standards that are enforced. In all of these
products, our mission is to provide the highest quality optical
products at a competitive price.
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