The founding of the Goldendale Observatory is the stuff of folklore. A half century ago, four amateur astronomers from Vancouver, Washington, built a telescope, then canvased the Cascade Mountains for a place to put it. Goldendale, a small town 100 miles northeast of Portland, Oregon, just inside the Washington State border, proved to be the perfect spot. Famous for its dark skies, the immediate area was inside a narrow geographical path that would experience three total eclipses within a century, a rarity. The idea of building an observatory—first encountered by locals overhearing a conversation among the astronomers at a diner—appealed to the town as a way to attract tourists. But the boxy, brick-clad structure Goldendale erected in 1973 looked more like rest-stop architecture familiar to drivers pulling off the road than what stargazers should see before staring up at the skies.