The Skyscraper Vol. 33 no. 4 The monthly publication of The Skyscraper April 2006 April Meeting FRIDAY, APRIL 7TH AT SEAGRAVE OBSERVATORY Dr. Upgren has had to cancel his visit to Seagrave for our April monthly meeting. The report is that his health has taken a signifi cant turn for the Amateur Astronomical Society worse. We wish Art a speedy recovery and hope he can reschedule in the of Rhode Island near future. 47 Peeptoad Road North Scituate, RI 02857 Brown University graduate students Clara Eberhardy and Carolyn Ernst www.theskyscrapers.org will present us with an update of the research being done on the data from President the Deep Impact Mission with Comet Tempel I. Dave Huestis 1st Vice President Glenn Jackson Elections Enclosed is the ballot for the election of offi cers for the 2006-7 fi scal year. nd 2 Vide President Please vote and mail it back right away, or bring it with you to the April Ted Ferneza meeting. Secretary Joel Cohen Treasurer Renewals Bill Kirby Membership renewals are now due. There is a renewal form on the back Members at Large page of this newsletter. Please renew promptly to avoid disruptions in Mercedes Rivero-Hudec your newsletter and magazine subscriptions. Jerry Jeffrey Trustees Richard Arnold Jack Szelka Marian Juskuv PRIL IN THIS ISSUE Librarian A 2006 PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE/ 2 Dan Lorraine 7:30PM April Meeting Seagrave Observatory VAN VLECK TRIP Dave Huestis Editor F7RIDAY Jim Hendrickson HOW I BECAME AN 3 8:00PM Public Observing Night AMATEUR ASTRONOMER See back page for directions to Seagrave Observatory, Gerry Dyck SATURDAY8 weather permitting Seagrave Observatory. SOME BRIGHT SPRING 4 DOUBLE STARS Submissions 8:00PM Public Observing Night Glen Chaple Please submit items for the newsletter by Seagrave Observatory, April 15 to Jim Hendrickson, 1 Sunfl ower S15ATURDAY weather permitting APRIL METEOR SHOWER 5 Circle, North Providence, RI 02911 or Dave Huestis email to [email protected] 8:00PM Public Observing Night SECRETARY’S REPORT 5 Email subscriptions: Seagrave Observatory, Joel Cohen To receive The Skyscraper by email, send S22ATURDAY weather permitting email with your name and address to THE “CONJUNCTION” OF 6 FRANK SEAGRAVE AND [email protected]. Note that you 8:00PM Public Observing Night PERCIVAL LOWELL will no longer receive the newsletter by Seagrave Observatory, Dave Huestis postal mail. S29ATURDAY weather permitting PLANETS IN STRANGE 11 © 2006 Skyscrapers, Inc. PLACES Trudy E Bell THE SKYSCRAPER • APRIL 2006 President’s Message Van Vleck Observatory Trip Dave Huestis, President Dave Huestis, President A special thank you to Gerry Dyck for his Have you had a “taxing” April? Want to relax and contribution to our “How I Became an Amateur enjoy the heavens? Astronomer” series. Please share your story with us in Skyscrapers is planning another trip to Van Vleck the May or June issue of the Skyscraper. Observatory at Wesleyan University in Middletown CT. April is election time for the Skyscraper On Saturday, April 15, Skyscrapers will have exclusive organization. Please fill out the ballot accompanying use of their 20-inch Alvan Clark refractor from 8-10:30 this newsletter and follow the instructions. We have a pm, thanks to members of the Astronomical Society of good slate of officers ready to guide our society for the Greater Hartford (ASGH) who have agreed to host our next year. organization. Annual dues are also payable in April, the beginning Here’s an opportunity to observe Saturn through of our fiscal year. Please fill out the renewal form in its the much bigger cousin of our 8 1/4 -inch Clark. entirety so we can insure our records are complete. You We will meet at Seagrave Observatory and car pool may pay your dues at the April meeting or you can send the 1 1/2 hours to Van Vleck. Departure time will be it to our mailing address. Please continue to support our 6:30pm sharp. If it is more convenient for you to meet us organization. Make checks payable to Skyscrapers, Inc. there, by all means please do so. You may get directions Please see an announcement in this issue regarding from the Van Vleck home page: a field trip to Van Vleck Observatory in Middletown, http://www.astro.wesleyan.edu/ CT, planned for Saturday, April 15th. If you plan on going, please send me your name, Most importantly, we will be returning to Seagrave phone number and email address, On the day of the trip, Observatory for our April monthly meeting on Friday, please check the Skyscraper web site for any weather April 7. I’m looking forward to welcoming everyone cancellation notice. If you do not have email, be sure to back to our home! The winter months really seemed to include your phone number so I can notify you of any drag on this year. cancellation. r. Upgren has had to cancel his visit to Seagrave for our April monthly meeting. The report is that his health has taken a significant turn for the worse. We wish Art a speedy recovery and hope he can reschedule in the near future. Late yesterday our good friend Peter Schultz of Brown University confirmed that two of his graduate students have volunteered to present a talk about their experiences with the Deep Impact Mission with Comet Tempel I. Because the newsletter is required to be in your hands 10 days before our April 7 election, we were not able to update it to reflect the committment of our volunteer speakers. When I send out my meeting reminder on the Wednesday before the April 7 meeting, I will provide more details about the speakers and their presentation. We thank Pete Schultz for helping us to secure not one, but two speakers on such short notice. Also, just to let you know, Glenn Jackson has rescheduled Ron Dantowitz for our November meeting. Thank you Glenn and Ron! So please join us for a wonderful evening at Seagrave Observatory as we welcome in Spring. 2 How I Became an Amateur Astronomer Gerry Dyck Here are a few vivid memories of events from out of bed to go outside to see a meteor shower or the my childhood and youth which guided me along sky glowing red and green with the Northern Lights. the path of amateur astronomy. I have related to you When I was five or six Dad announced one evening several times how my father, Walter, and my Uncle that he would wake us before dawn the next morning Paul were the two people who laid the groundwork to see a comet. And so he did. He drove my sister for my astronomical interest by their innovative Evelyn and me in the old Hudson to the eastern edge determination to build a 7” f/10 reflector from scratch of town to see a small, but very bright comet. I cannot on their Kansas farm in 1931. This was eight years say which one it was, but it was similar in aspect to before I was born. That story can rest, but the fate of Comet Bennet in 1970. the telescope itself should be told. I recall a frightening In 1940 the builders’ paths experience in my seventh or eighth parted as Uncle Paul moved year. We neighborhood boys were to California and my Dad took playing outside after dark one his family to Nebraska, where I summer evening when the ground grew into self-consciousness. The beneath us was suddenly lit up telescope was too massive for a long with a greenish glow brighter than trip and which one should have it? the full moon. We looked up to see The solution was to donate it to a the glowing trail of a giant fireball. high school in nearby Burton KS, When I stopped running I was where its makers hoped it would safely under the covers of my bed. live a long and useful life and I had much to ponder under the serve the community as a valued covers, for I had been suffering all educational tool. But it was not to that day from a guilty conscience be. World War 2 was raging and from helping myself to some pears in the wake of Pearl Harbor came from a neighbor’s tree. Until I public appeals for scrap metal finally summoned up the courage to support the massive military to confide in my mother a week buildup. The patriotic fervor of later, I was sure that I had just the Burton school board overcame barely escaped divine retribution their scientific loyalties and the scope was donated to for my thievery. the war effort as junk metal. A happier recollection will resonate with many When my Dad learned of this outrage he was of you. As a teen I went to our church camp in the as mad as a pacifist Mennonite minister might justly sparsely inhabited wilderness of western Kansas. be. He made a hurried trip back to Kansas to try to We were all supposed to sleep in our cabins under salvage his masterpiece. He was just in time to save the watchful eye of our supervisor. But Laurence the tube assembly from the metal crusher, but not the and I were able to sneak out and spend two or three mount. And so it came to be that my first impression of nights in our sleeping bags under a moonless Milky a telescope was a big, long metal tube to be carried to Way. The brilliance of all those knots of light, which the back yard and leaned against a chair or fence post.