“In a sense, the steady-state”: Hoyle 1990. In his excellent account of the history of the steady state theory, Kragh 1996 raised doubts about the authenticity of the film story. However, shortly after the New York Times reported (on May 24, 1952) on a lecture by the Astronomer Royal, Sir Harold Spencer Jones, Hoyle wrote him a letter in which he specifically mentioned the film story. The fact that this letter was written as early as 1952 gives this account more credibility.

“What happened was that there was”: Weart 1978.

in a paper published in 1929: Hubble 1929a.

the Russian mathematician Aleksandr Friedmann: Friedmann 1922.

a passionate debate flared up: A few of the articles about the credit for the discovery of cosmic expansion are Way and Nussbaumer 2011, Nussbaumer and Bieri 2011, Van den Bergh 2011, and Block 2011.