In September 1952 Dr. Walter Beade of Mount Wilson-Palomar Observatories made an announcement to the International Astronomical Union that shocked astronomers. Observations with the two hundred-inch Hale telescope at his observatoy had revealed that all objects beyond the Milky Way were twice as far from Earth as previously believed. By the new calculations the Andromeda Nebula was shown to be 1.7 million light-years from Earth, meaning that whatever light from the nebula might reach us would have begun its travel 1.7 million years ago.

Dr. Beade's discovery affected calculations of the age as well as the size of the universe. His best estimate was that the universe was 3.9 billion years old, not 1.8 billion years, as astronomers had previously believed. The new calculation corresponded to radioactive dating of the Earth's crust.

Source: William T. Couch , Collier's 1954 Year Book (New York: Collier's, 1954).