Future telescopes?

When we left the moon back in 70s, we confidently wrote it off as a cold and incredibly dry place and many believed there as not much more to know about our satellite. Hard to believe that four decades, later, we are sending a probe to not only scout for a possible moon base, but also to see if there is water in the bottom of some of the moon craters at the pole. Yes, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter will be launched, later this week and should it succeed in locating ice at the bottom of a crater, that will, in my opinion, be one of the greatest shots in the arm for our space program since we left the moon four decades, ago. Ice will make a moon base for more likely and possible, not to mention change our views about space exploration in general. Of course, back in those days, we didn't suspect Jupiter's moon Europa to possibly have an entire ocean of water below an icy crust or that the even more distant Titan, the largest moon of Saturn, would have landforms similar to Earth's. Rings around Uranus and Neptune? Yeah, right. Pluto no longer a planet? That's crazy! Yes, we've learned a lot over these decades.

I started my amateur astronomy in a serious way about the time we retired our Apollo program. As I look back on amateur astronomy over these last four decades, I am also amazed at how much it has changed. A computer? On a telescope? Not in the 70s. No one even owned a personal computer in those days and the thought of adding a computer to a telescope was science fiction, even for many professional observatories. How about a 10" telescope? Pretty average size telescope, these days, but a 10" telescope was a monster for most amateur astronomers in the early 70s. In fact, a lot of us thought a 3" refractor was a big deal. APO refractors like a Televue? No such thing. Of course, we didn't have as much light pollution, either and, in fact, that term had yet to come in vogue. Schmidt-Cassegrains? Maksutovs? Not readily available and very expensive. Meade telescopes and Celestron telescopes had only just begun to become standard equipment on the amateur astronomy landscape.

What will the future bring in the way of our Space Program and amateur telescopes? No way will I hazard a guess, but I hope I am around to see it.