Dobson was born to Methodist missionary parents in China, but moved with his family back to the U.S. as a young child.

In his later life, Dobson resumed regular association with a branch of the Vedanta order in southern California, but continued to dedicate most of his time to promoting public astronomy.

His maternal grandfather was the missionary Hiram Harrison Lowry, his mother was a musician, and his father taught zoology at a university.

He earned a master's degree in chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley in 1943, working in E. O. Lawrence's lab.

Amateur telescope making was not part of the curriculum at the monastery, however, and much of his correspondence was written in code so as to attract less attention.

He was later asked to speak at the Vedanta Society of Southern California in Hollywood, and continued to spend two months there each year teaching telescope and cosmology classes.

Dobson claimed the Big Bang model did not hold up to scrutiny,[7][8] and instead advocated a non-standard cosmology; a “recycling” Steady State model of the universe, where matter in the universe is forever expanding outward, but matter also “recycles” over time via quantum tunneling.

[9] In 2004, the Crater Lake Institute presented Dobson with its Annual Award for Excellence in Public Service for pioneering sidewalk astronomy in the national parks and forests, “where curious minds and dark skies collide”.

[3] The design is a very simple, low cost alt-azimuth mounted Newtonian telescope that employs common materials such as plywood, Formica®, PVC closet flanges, cardboard construction tubes, recycled porthole glass, and indoor-outdoor carpet.

Rather than have regular meetings, the organization simply set up telescopes on the sidewalk during clear evenings, offering to show and explain the night sky to people passing by.

This telescope was portable enough that it could be taken by Dobson from his residence to many busy street corners in San Francisco, using the city's Muni public transportation.

The current organization has members throughout the world, and continues to promote public service astronomy by putting telescopes on street corners in urban areas.

Members of the organization also visit national parks giving slide show presentations, providing telescope viewing, and explaining the universe.

A 1991 book by Dobson & Sperling on telescope-making[20] helped popularize what came to be known as the Dobsonian mount, and treats the why as being as important as the how.