Ashlee VanceNYT Best Seller | Reporter at Bloomberg Businessweek

The Great Texan Telescope Ranch #tech #stars #astronomy #astrophotography #texas

11 May 2026 · 1 min

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In this brief on‑site video, a co‑founder of Starfront Observatories explains the unique business model of the Great Texan Telescope Ranch at Bray Falls, Texas. Telescopes from around the world are shipped to the remote site, where they are housed in purpose‑built buildings. All mounts are set in a standard "park" position, pointing north at Polaris, to protect the equipment. The location is deliberately far from any city lights, offering exceptionally dark skies for astronomy and astrophotography. Users access their instruments remotely via a computer interface, allowing them to conduct observations and capture images without ever traveling to the site. The clip also gives a quick visual tour inside one of the observatory buildings.

What we have here is a very, very weird way to make a living. People send Bray their telescopes and he houses them in these buildings.
This is the standard park position for all the mounts, and they're all pointed north at Polaris or the North Celestial Pole.
This is Bray Falls, which sounds like a city in Texas.
I am one of the co-founders of Starfront Observatories, and what this place is is a remote observatory. It's in the middle of nowhere. There's no city lights. People from all around the world send their telescopes here to observe the night sky. From this place with no light pollution. We set them up and they can all access their stuff through a computer remotely and then use their telescope to actually do observations or take photos.
All right, this is the inside of Building Number 2.