What's the origin of Clyde Tombaugh's 9-inch Newtonian telescope?
In the first chapter of Out of the Darkness: The Planet Pluto, Tombaugh gives a colorful, personal account of his youth in Illinois and Kansas, including five telescopes:


his uncle's uncorrected 3-inch refractor
a 2.25-inch achromatic Sears-Roebuck refractor his father and uncle shared
a mediocre 8-inch reflector he made in 1926
a better 7-inch reflector he made for his uncle
an excellent 9-inch reflector he made in 1928


The last two benefited from optical testing in a storm cellar built extra long for that purpose.
Tombaugh's planetary sketches using the 9-inch reflector got him the job at Lowell Observatory.

The same photo appears on page 23 with this caption:


  Clyde W. Tombaugh, at the age of twenty-two, with his homemade 9-inch (22.9-centimeter) reflecting telescope on the family farm near Burdett, Kansas.
  This picture was taken in the summer of 1928, eighteen months before the discovery of Pluto.


APOD 1997-02-04 (&copy; 1996 K. Beatty) shows him at age 89 with the same telescope in New Mexico.