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On
April 21st
many astronomy clubs, planetariums, and science museums all over the
world
celebrated Astronomy Day. Its purpose is
to “bring astronomy to the people” through
educational displays,
hands-on
activities, lectures, and sharing the splendors of the sky. Normally,
the
Kalamazoo Astronomical Society holds its activities whenever the
Kalamazoo
Nature Center holds Free Admission Day.
This year, however, those two dates were the same. So, the
KAS
held its Astronomy Day bash on
the “officially” recognized date.
 Preparation
for
April 21st actually began the day
before. My Astronomy
Day Co-Coordinator Jean
DeMott, along with Tim
Kurtz, Rich
Mather, Tom
Roland,
and Roger Williams,
met at the
Nature Center to haul items up to the
Glen Vista Room and set up as much as possible.
Almost everything was set, but (naturally) there were a few items that
we forgot to bring. Plus, we needed a
way to hang up our banner. Thanks to Tim
for buying some ceiling tile hangers.
We’ll make sure to hold on to those!
The weather on
Saturday, April 21st was fantastic!
Skies were mostly sunny, with only thin clouds present throughout the
day. The high temperature was a pleasant
74º F. Some folks thought the weather
was too good (more on that later).
Our Astronomy Day staple, solar observing, would have been a huge draw
if it wasn’t for the harsh reality of solar
minimum. Bill
Nigg shared views of the Sun
with
a white light filter on his 5” Astro-Physics refractor in the
Nature
Center’s
main parking lot the entire day. Not a
sunspot or even a patch of faculae were to be seen. Those of
us
on the Glen Vista Deck didn’t
have much luck either, which was a shame since we had a record number
of
telescopes equipped with hydrogen-alpha filters this year.
Jim
Kurtz came equipped with a Coronado SolarMax 40 mounted on
his
Tele Vue 85 refractor. Roger Williams
again setup his Coronado MaxScope 60 and I had a SolarMax 40 filter on
my Tele
Vue Pronto. There was also the public
debut of the KAS’s Coronado Personal Solar Telescope (PST)
mounted on a
Tele
Vue Tele-Pod. Thanks to Tim Kurtz for
keeping an eye on the PST and my setup while I was off taking pictures
and
making sure things ran smoothly.
Unfortunately, the Sun only sported the tiniest of
prominences.
One filament was barely visible and was best
seen when I stacked my SolarMax filter onto the PST. That was
cool!
As soon as patrons
walked into the Glen Vista Room they were greeted by Jean DeMott and Molly
Williams during the morning and again by Jean and Rich
Mather in
the
afternoon. Thanks also to Dave
Woolf
for filling in for Jean at the greeting table throughout the day.
This years theme was
NASA’s Great Observatories. These
include the Chandra X-ray Observatory, Spitzer Space Telescope, and the
legendary Hubble Space Telescope. Due to
time, space, and financial restraints we left out the now-defunct
Compton
Gamma-Ray Observatory. This year, our theme
displays were the best ever. Jean and I
really out did ourselves. Some of the
materials for the Hubble and Spitzer displays were provided by NASA and
JPL. Almost all the Chandra material was
provided by the Chandra X-ray Center (CXC).
Special thanks to John Little at CXC for making sure the materials
arrived right when we needed them.
We had a full
compliment of hands-on activities this year.
To go along with our theme, we brought back the Hubble Space Telescope
models. Kids made their own mini-HST out
of a 6 ounce tomato paste can and a toilet paper roll all wrapped in
aluminum
foil. We even made sure the cardboard
solar panels were cut down to match Hubble’s current
pair. Rich
Mather and Jack Roach
helped
kids
build HSTs in the afternoon and brand new KAS member Amie Harpe and
Molly Williams took over in the afternoon.
Our second hands-on
activity allowed kids to cut out and decorate stars of different colors
and shapes. We provided some wacky face stickers, star
stickers, glitter pens, and other fun items so the kids could create a
custom
star pal. Perhaps not terribly
educational, but the kids loved it! Tom
Roland and Norm Terry
covered
the star table in the morning and my
oldest niece, Alexis Bell,
and
her friend, Amber Stilson,
took
charge in the afternoon. Perhaps another
of the Bell clan will join the KAS someday!
Her uncle could only hope.
The third hands-on
activity was the coloring table. We had
six different works of art to choose from. Robert Norton
covered the coloring table in the morning and John
Miller, Professor of Chemistry at Western Michigan
University,
took over in
the afternoon. Just goes to show you’ve
got to have high credentials to work at the KAS Coloring
Table!
Again, thanks to all the KAS [and family]
members that volunteered their time at the hands-on tables.
It’s
the toughest job at Astronomy Day, but
the most fun.
The KAS again had
two special attractions at this years Astronomy Day. The
first
was Astronomy Day Theater. We played all five features from
the
Discovery Channel’s Ultimate
Space
Collection DVD set and the episode Encyclopedia
Galactica from the classic and award winning series Cosmos, hosted by
the
late Dr. Carl Sagan. The main reasons
for Astronomy Day Theater was to make use of the alcove in the Glen
Vista Room
and to give folks a nice spot to sit down and relax for a
bit.
However, I was surprised to watch some people
actually sit down and watch entire programs.
The biggest crowd was for Cosmos.
It just goes to show that Carl can still draw a crowd! By the
way, the Ultimate Space
Collection
DVD set is now available for checkout from the KAS Library.
The other special
attraction was a big hit. I’ve been
wanting to do an “Ask the Astronomer” feature for
sometime, but I was
trying to
think of something more interesting than just someone answering
questions at a
boring table. One day it hit me - design
a stand after Lucy’s “Psychiatric Help
5¢” stand from The
Peanuts
cartoons. I’d be shocked if some club
somewhere hasn’t done the same thing.
Seems only natural to me!
Fortunately, someone agreed to build it. Dick & Jackie Gillespie
took up the challenge and did
an absolutely tremendous job. Dick did
the woodwork while Jackie painted the lettering. The stand
was
perfect and I wouldn’t change a
thing. Mark
Miller
started off
from 10 am - 12 pm and was followed by WMU Associate Professor of
Astronomy Dr.
Kirk Korista from 12 pm - 2 pm. Last
up was KAMSC astronomy teacher Mike
Sinclair. Mike would be very upset if I forgot
to
mention that he made the most money answering questions; a little over
$2! Of course, the 5¢ charge was
voluntary! I must also
thank Jack Roach for delivering
and setting up the stand. Dick became
ill just before Astronomy Day, so my only regret was that he
couldn’t
see his
great creation in use. Rest assured, we
will use it again.
Main programming
ended at 4:00 pm. Thanks to all those
that stayed behind to help pack up and haul everything away.
Attendance wise, this years event was very
similar to 2006. The Nature Center
doesn’t have exact figures, since they didn't have anyone
stationed at
the
parking lot gate house. However, they
estimate 500 people attended Free Admission Day. It did seem
like
less adults were walking
through our area, but we did seem to have more kids at the hands-on
tables. Some members speculated that attendance may
have been down because the weather was too nice. There could
be
some truth to this since much
of April had snow and below average temperatures. The Nature
Center’s Free Admission Day is
still our best option for Astronomy Day, since many of
Kalamazoo’s big
attractions have vanished in the past decade.
Four hours later,
several of us returned to the Nature Center for our regularly scheduled
Public
Observing Session. Jim Kurtz setup his
Celestron 8” Schmidt-Cassegrain and Tim Kurtz brought his
Meade 4”
apochromatic
refractor. Bill Nigg again setup his
Astro-Physics refractor and Robert Norton provided his Celestron
10”
Dobsonian. Roger Williams also setup his
hand-crafted trischiefspiegler (folded reflector) on his new equatorial
platform. Being too tired to bring out
my own ’scope, I made due with the Meade 12”
Schmidt-Cassegrain in Owl
Observatory.
Thanks to the
spectacular conditions, we easily surpassed last years Astronomy Day
observing
attendance. We have a tough time keeping
count of attendees, but approximately 50-60 people attended our first
successful session of the year. The
night time temperature was right were I like it, in the
mid-40’s.
Like I always say: “too warm for frost, too cold
for bugs.”
Interested patrons were treated to fantastic
views of the Waxing Crescent Moon, Venus, and Saturn.
Moonlight
wasn’t severe enough to effect
views of deep sky objects, so we also got to treat visitors to the
galaxies of
Leo and Virgo. We also witnessed a
passage of the International Space Station.
Lastly, I gave everyone a star map reading lesson and tour of the
constellations with the KAS’s new 55 mW green laser
pointer. No
more squinting to see my 5 mW laser!
Jean and I worked very hard
on this year’s Astronomy Day. Of course,
all of our work would have been in vain if it wasn’t for all
our
dedicated
members. Again, thank you for
volunteering part of your weekend and thanks to those that at least
showed up
to appreciated our efforts. The KAS is
fortunate to have so many generous members.
Astronomy Day 2008 is already in the works. I hope
you’ll be
there!
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Report
and images
by Richard Bell |
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Click
Image for Larger View
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![[Astronomy Day 2007 - April 21]](Images/AD2K7/astroday07.jpg)
