The Addison White Greenway, Jr. Visitor Center

Palomar Observatory will be closed to the public on Thanksgiving Day, Thursday 28 November.
Updated Wed 20 Nov 2024 9:37 am PST

The Addison White Greenway, Jr. Visitor Center. (Palomar/Caltech)

Greenway Visitor Center vestibule with ZTF display and guestbook. (Palomar/Caltech)

The Addison White Greenway, Jr. Visitor Center (also known as the Palomar Museum) is located just southeast from the parking lot along a paved path. It was dedicated in 1947 by astronomy enthusiast and Caltech patron Kate Bruce Ricketts to honor the memory of her son.

At the Visitor Center's entrance, a large graphic banner of the nearby star-forming region known as the Orion Nebula (M42) invites visitors to explore the Universe as seen through the Palomar telescopes. A heavily-researched deep-sky object and a favorite among astrophotographers, the Orion Nebula is a typical star-forming region—not unlike that from which the Sun and the Solar System is thought to have originated. Inside at the museum visitors learn about the history of the Observatory, legendary scientific discoveries made with Palomar's telescopes and instruments since first light to the present, and the latest developments in the world of astronomy. The center also contains a gift shop and the ticket counter for docent guided tours.

See information on specific exhibits and events at the Greenway Center:

• Searching the Sky for Dangerous Neighbors
• Luskin Virtual Presence Kiosk
• Learning from Astronomical Spectra
• Greenway Talk Series

The Visitor Center is open during the Observatory's regular visiting hours. See our page on Visiting Palomar for opening hours, directions, and more information.

This bilingual, high-resolution tour embeds relevant information, images, and video of the Visitor Center. We recommend viewing the virtual tour on a desktop or laptop in fullscreen mode using the icon in the control bar. While it is possible to view the tour in smaller screens (e.g., large tablets), we suggest using the "lite" version of the tour for screens narrower than 700px (e.g, smaller tablets and smartphones). The lite tour is also VR-enabled, but lacks many of the features found in the full version of the tour. Click here to load the full tour.

Visitor Center

Bilingual, annotated tour of the Visitor Center, desktop version. (Palomar/Caltech/A.Mejía)

"Lite" Virtual Tour

Bilingual, annotated tour of the Visitor Center, mobile version. (Palomar/Caltech/A.Mejía)