Camp Asbury visits observatory

This morning Stephens Observatory hosted a group of 18 from a local church camp, vising as part of a "Space Week" program. Despite the hazy, hot, and humid conditions, seeing was surprisingly good. I pointed the grand old 9-inch scope, with its nice new Baader solar filter in place, at the sun and shared the view. We had a nice spidery little sunspot (designated Sunspot 961) to look at and could also make out granulation in the solar atmosphere. (View similar to the SOHO photo at right but in white light, not orange.) I'd never seen granulation with my own eyes and enjoyed the experience as much as or more than did the kids ... though they certainly were an enthusiastic and bright group. Just before I left I learned a respected previous Observatory director, J.R. Andress, had sneaked in for a personal visit to see what I've been up to. He left a note in the Observatory log to that effect and that he liked what he saw; also leaving his contact info.

Open: Alumni Day and night

The sky had a thin covering of milky clouds all day. Still, I had announced a daytime SMO open house and nighttime stargazing session for Hiram College Alumni Day and I had to honor my commitment. The daytime, solar viewing session didn't do much. We had 12 visitors between 9 AM and Noon and we didn't look at the Sun -- the clouds made for an indistinct solar disk and the Sun itself was a blank showing no sunspots at all. Visitors, however, did seem to enjoy seeing the telescope and talking about it and the Observatory. The adult daughter of former Observatory director J.R. Andress stopped by with her dog and recollected spending many pleasant girlhood nights under the dome with her father. Time passed quickly. I closed up and headed home. The evening saw a somewhat thinner cloud layer. It was, however, in evidence. I headed to the Observatory knowing that people would see stars overhead and wonder why we weren't open for the evening if I didn't show up. I knew that whatever we might look at would run the risk of being quite unimpressive. As darkness fell more and more stars appeared but, as expected, close examination with telescope and binoculars revealed the filtering effect of those, now invisible, high clouds. Would anyone actually show up? Then the people started arriving. The Observatory dome was full of visitors before Jupiter rose above the trees. Still they waited patiently and expectantly as the bright planet inched its way into visibility. The view was not very distinct but, with patience, we could just make out Jupiter's two major cloud bands. The Galilean moons shown like golden stars in a pattern to the left of the planet. By the time the evening finished --with a man and his two young daughters, all on bicycles at 11 PM-- we had entertained 36 nighttime visitors between 9:30 and 11:00 PM. Even though Jupiter was all we could view on this night of murky skies, our guests left apparently happy and impressed. People do still love the starry realm and it's a pleasure to share it with them.

A good night to look at the stars

It was a good night to get out and look at the stars. I've not been at Stephens Memorial Observatory (SMO) for quite some time and have missed two excellent nights. Last night's sky conditions weren't as good as Saturday and Sunday night's but I wasn't up to going out. It's been a physically and emotionally draining week. I packed my observing kit into the car and took off for the dark(er) skies of Portage County. It's nearing summer solstice so twilight seems to go on forever. With trees tall around the observatory Jupiter, which rose before sunset, didn't clear the trees until a little after 10:00 PM. Seeing wasn't the best for that big, brilliant planet, but I could make out some of the colored bands of Jupiter's atmosphere. I went fishing for a couple of galaxies but never found them; I still have much to learn about aiming the big telescope! After a while I went back to Jupiter and, unfortunately, sky conditions weren't quite as good as earlier. In the mean time Scorpius had risen above the trees and, using red Antares as a guide, found the beautiful globular star cluster M4, 5,600 light years distant. In the eyepiece the cluster looked elongated vertically and not so densely packed as most of the globulars I've seen; I liked it all the more for that! I attached a digital camera to the century-old telescope and tried to image Jupiter but still am not happy with the results. Eyepiece projection produces soft images (maybe due to poor physical coupling) and the adapter is too long for prime-focus. I'll have to work on better coupling of the camera to the telescope and buy a short coupler. Closed up and left at about 11:30 PM with a sore neck (from looking up) but feeling refreshed. A last look back at the observatory building silhouetted against a very starry sky brought a smile to my face. A most excellent way to end the day!