Moon atlases

The moon is just past full tonight and I've been viewing the terminator the last couple of nights -- and looking around the house for my Rukl's Atlas.  It seems to have disappeared and I can't find a good substitute.  I've got Hatfield, Kaguya, Lunar Orbiter, and Chuck Wood's wonderful book.  Oh, and Harold Hill's absolutely jaw-dropping "Portfolio of Lunar Drawings".

With the exception of the last, none of these latter books is drawn.  That is, the illustrations are photographs.  And they're wonderful photographs showing far more detail than virtually anyone can draw (or really even "take in" when viewed through a telescope).  However, Rukl's book consists of detailed drawings that are not affected by lunar phase.  So you can get a better sense of where stuff is.

Which led me to wonder about the Lunar Quadrant Maps that the U of A's Lunar & Planetary Lab put out in the 1960s.  I think I might need a copy.  They're drawn -- not a lot of detail, but virtually any feature of significant size is shown.  I believe they're online, but I think they deserve a physical copy.  Does anyone know how to get a physical copy?

Lick saved! (for now...)

I've previously mentioned that I volunteer at Lick Observatory for their summer visitor program.  I got the chance to look at M13 through the 36-inch refractor a couple of weeks ago and am thankful that the UC Regents has decided to keep Lick as a research station.  Lick does more than any other full-time research facility to accommodate the public and promote astronomy and astrophysics "awareness" among the public.  Tours are given many days of the week, and nearly every Friday and Saturday night during the summer, there are concerts and public viewing (tickets offered in advance). The staff at Lick works very hard at these events and I'm glad that the 120-inch, the APF, the Katzman, the 40-inch, and the Great Lick Refractor will have a chance to shove photons into various detectors, including (in the last two telescopes) people's eyes.

http://www.ucolick.org/SaveLick/

NY Times article on repurposed telescopes

Interesting NY Times article on National Reconnaissance Office telescopes (definitely classic, natch!) possibly being repurposed for Dark Energy research at NASA.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/05/science/space/repurposed-telescope-may-explore-secrets-of-dark-energy.html?_r=2&pagewanted=1&hp

Boller and Chivens

One of my favorites pastimes as a kid was to peruse the various professional telescope and observatory ads in Sky & Telescope magazine. I started subscribing just as Group 128 was ceasing operations. But I remember gazing wistfully at the Boller and Chivens ads -- they, the vendor of beauutiful 16-inch and up telescopes. At the tender age of 13 or 14, I swore I would own one someday, housed tastefully in an Observa-Dome Laboratories dome on some remote mountain top. Alas, that has not transpired, but I can still hope!

Meanwhile, it has surfaced that not much is widely known about Boller and Chivens. However, relatively recently, numerous images have been posted in an attempt to solicit information about their operations. Do check out the images and please contribute if you know something about them.

http://www.chesmontastro.org/?q=node/4355

John Brashear

It's been a while since I've written anything here. If anyone is following this blog, my apologies. (I suspect no one in their right mind is reading any of this, but I'm not exactly in my right mind either. I'm more of a lefty...)

Having recently been up at Lick again, I've been thinking of telescope makers. John Brashear's efforts don't get the same accolades the Clarks do, but his telescopes were equally good (and his instruments, like micrometers, spectroscopes, and astrographs had excellent reputations). I read Brashear's autobiography many years ago and found some great resources online:

For a wonderful set of links about the man & his scopes:

http://johnbrashear.tripod.com/

For a digital, online version of his autobiography:
http://digital.library.pitt.edu/cgi-bin/t/text/text-idx?c=pitttext&view=toc&idno=00c867671m

And if you ever get to Oakland, California and want to look through a 20-inch refractor, Chabot Observatory offers viewing through an 8-inch Clark refractor, the 20-inch, and a 36-inch reflector:

http://www.chabotspace.org/observatories.htm

18,900 Euros anyone?

You can be the owner of this antique Zeiss 4-inch refractor if you have enough cash laying around.  (Note: I'm not affiliated with APM Telescopes, just an admirer of some of their stock-on-hand.)

http://www.apm-telescopes.de/secondhand.php?backjump=669#669

Beautiful pictures

Cincinnati Observatory is the oldest, continuously running professional observatory in the United States. The observatory's telescopes are simply gorgeous. Wander over to their webpage and take a look.

http://www.cincinnatiobservatory.org/

Beyond the Visitor's Gallery

As a volunteer at Lick Observatory for their Summer Visitor's Program, I had the chance of a back-stage tour of Lick.  I took my kids and we were able to breathe the same air as the Shane Telescope, the 120-inch reflector.  Built in 1959, it was the second largest telescope in the world.  It now ranks well below that lofty place but is still quite possibly one of the coolest-looking telescopes in the world.

And, the astronomers have certainly not stood still admiring its good looks.  Lick is the site of the world's highest resolution spectrograph, used to discover extra-solar planets, and a wicked green laser for adaptive optics research.  The mountain also is home to the Katzman automated telescope that discovers about two supernovae a week (and emails the staff when it thinks it has got something).  A sweet 40-inch yoke-mounted Cassegrain (made of essentially "spare parts" in 1979), the Crossley 36-inch reflector (mentioned elsewhere in this august blog), and the world's second largest refractor -- the 36-inch f/19 monster!

http://www.ucolick.org/public/telescopes/shane.html