After a trip to Germany where he witnessed the history-making first Zeiss projection planetarium, which had opened its doors in 1925, retired Sears, Roebuck & Co. executive Max Adler was eager to bring the technology to Chicago. In addition to making a donation of $500,000 (today, about $9.5 million) to drive the process, Adler purchased a collection of historical scientific instruments to elevate the new institution’s credentials and prestige. Architect Ernst Grunsfeld designed a 12-sided building on Chicago’s Northerly Island to house the planetarium, and when it opened on May 12, 1930 – Max Adler’s birthday – Adler Planetarium became the first modern planetarium in America.
It remained a landmark destination and a force for public education through the 1933-34 World’s Fair, the midcentury space race, and growth and facility expansions in the 1970s and ’90s. Today its planetarium star shows are supplemented by permanent galleries on exoplanets, the Mars Rovers, historical astronomical instruments, and more, plus public outreach programs and citizen science projects. Adler sees about a half-million visitors a year.
