For the entirety of human history, we have been fascinated by the stars and planets that dot the sky. It’s only recently that we have been able to get close to space and begin to understand its amazing properties. When I first saw this 1919 picture of nebulae in the Pleiades, I was surprised to see such an old photograph of distant stars. To think that an image like this was published just a year shy of the end of the First World War and over 40 years before the first man stepped foot in outer space seems almost beyond comprehension.

The image was taken at the Yerkes Observatory in Williams Bay, Wisconsin. Yerkes has the largest refracting telescope—all