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Alachua Astronomy Club, Inc. |  Member Astronomical League |
 Member International Dark-Sky Association |
| FirstLight's First Ten Years |
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| 29°39' N, 82°21' W Altitude: 50 Meters (more or less) |
Updated Jan. 17, 1999 | ||
| (Click logo for home page) | Founded: September 1987 | (Developed with Netscape 4.x) |
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| FirstLight is the official, monthly publication of the Alachua Astronomy Club (AAC), Gainesville, Florida USA. Copyright © 1987-99. All rights reserved. |
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Kanapaha Moonlight Walk: Update
by Dave Godman"Set them up and they will come" sure came true on Saturday night, May 13th. With over 1100 persons in attendance at the Botanical Garden's moonlight walk, we had each of six telescopes in use all evening long. Most impressive, of course, was many observers' first look at the Moon through a telescope. We had five scopes trained on it and still had lines of up to 20 waiting for their chance. Did you notice how the largest scopes always seem to draw the most people? Bruno found out the hard way. When he set up his 12.5-inch Dobsonian and turned it to Mars, he was mobbed! Many comments were heard about telescopes that people had as kids or those they haven't pulled out of the closet in years. Perhaps this will give them the incentive to get re-acquainted with the night sky. Thanks to our members and their families who helped with this endeavor.
Set your calendars for November 4th for the next moonlight walk. As a parting note, when things were winding down, scopes being disassembled and the crowds leaving, Jupiter rose to the top of the tree line. I moved the club's six-inch Newtonian about 50 feet further north and treated the remaining 30 or so stragglers and volunteers to its brilliance with all four moons lined up on the eastern side. After this I know I'll be back.
Notes:
Dobsonian A Dobsonian telescope, an instrument with an altazimuth mount (up-down, left-right) with Teflon bearings.
Newtonian a type of reflecting telescope devised by Issac Newton. A concave mirror reflects the light up to a flat mirror that then reflects the light off to the side. This type of telescope is popular with amateurs.
[Ed.]
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