The "Cooke" 7-inch refracting telescope was impoted by H.W. Fitchett of Melbourne and at that time was the third largest privately-owned refractor telescope in the country and was capable of useful research. The second owner was Dr. W.E. McFarlane of Irvinebank, Queensland and Riverview has had it now for 90 years.

In 1922 Mr. J. Mann, presented to Riverview Observatory the "Cooke" telescope as a memorial to his son, Lieutentant Alfred Mann, who attended the College with his brothers in 1905-1910 and was killed at Luxeuil, France in 1916. Alfred use to assist Fr. Pigot in making drawings of Sun-spots and they used a small refractor for doing this.

With the installation of the "Cooke" Fr. Pigot had to decide from a variety of research programmes that a telescope of this size it should be assigned as he was convinced that "Some very good research was possible using the Cooke telescope and the work undetaken should be a worthwhile contribution to science". Fr. Pigot attending the Pacific Science Congress in Tokyo and on his return tips visite Bosscna Observatory in Lemband, Jave where he had discussions with the director, D. J. Voute, about collaborative research in astronomy and they decided that Riverview Observatory should focus on variable stars and not the visual monitoring of known stars but instead the photographic search for new stars.

In 1931 Fr. W O'Leary inaugurated a programe to photograph observations of variable stars. Variable stars vary in brightness rather than in position. This program was carried on until 1959, when deterioration of atmospheric conditions caused its ceassation. A telescope and camera were presented to Riverview Observatory in 1932 by Dr. J. Voute of Lembang Observatory, Java. A series of valuable publications by Fr. O'Leary and Fr. Daniel O'Connell resulted from the observations of variable stars. Fr. O'Leary has also completed a blink comparator for use in examining photographs of variable stars. Fr.O'Connell in July 1952 became Director of the Vatican Observatory.

In 1974 while the "Clock Drive" was on loan to the C.S.I.R.O the telescope was dismantled the dome roof and concrete pier of the telescope were repaired. Again in 1995 and 2008 the telescope and building have had major repairs or upgrades carried out.

During 2004 the transit of Venus was observed at 4th field weather station, again photographs were taken of this event. This time a digital SLR camera was fitted to a 6 inch telescope.