This article was contributed by David Baumgartner as part of a local series on astronomy. Lea este articulo en español aquí.
I have received a number of comments from people accusing me of snooping around in their closets and garages. For how else would I have known about those dusty telescopes sitting there unattended and unused? I guess many of you have forgotten, or just weren’t aware of the fact, that I spent the last 40 working years as owner/broker of Baumgartner Realty here in Hollister, and six years with Intero Real Estate. And what does this have to do with anything, you say?
Well, being in real estate, I had the opportunity to preview a number of homes on the market each week. With that in mind, I was fortunate to be able to look through many closets and garages. Now with some of these hidden storage areas, the word fortunate may not be the proper descriptive word for it. Some of them I was very hesitant to even enter, let alone touch anything. But I must admit, it did take me back to 340 Hawkins Street as a kid, when not even my mother would chance a stroll into my room, especially late at night.
Taking notice of the abandoned telescopes made me wonder, how long has it been since these poor scopes have seen the dark of night? (See the play on words there, “Light of Day/Dark of Night,” never mind…) What I believe happens is that one day the child asks the parent how far away the moon is, or something like that that has to do with astronomy. The parent has no idea what the answer is but is excited that the child, who up to this point has had an interest in only, well nothing, now has an interest in astronomy. So, let’s get the child a telescope. And why not? It’s a great idea.
A couple of days go by with the excitement increasing. And here it is sitting on the front porch ready to be opened. The child notices his father having a hard time figuring out how to put this family project together, so the child takes out the unused manual that the father didn’t think would be helpful and takes over the construction. The child has it put together in five minutes. Nice try pops.
The sun has dipped below the horizon, followed by the darkness scattered with bright objects. It’s all going good up until now. This is where it all goes downhill, until the child brings out the instruction guide. The Father says, “Yes I was going to bring that out next.” Right…….
Even with the instructions, if you don’t have knowledge of the night skies, it is a good chance you will have a hard time finding anything of interest, except maybe the moon. A lot of people think it is the lack of the telescope’s size and ability that is the problem, but not to be. It’s not the telescope’s fault at all. It is usually the inability of the new owner to find anything to look at with the scope.
Now with all this inability going around, sometimes the new owner comes up with what he/she believes is a good idea; let’s put the new toy in the closet, or maybe hidden in the back of the garage for now.
Why did all those telescopes get stashed away amongst all this dust? Well, now you know the rest of the story. Or do you? This is where I come in singing, “Here I come to save the day.” Well, you get my point. I suggest to the family that we first rescue the unit from the dungeon and carefully dust it. Pretend it is Christmas Day and we’re all excited to open the biggest package, the brand new telescope. But this time I’ve made them all aware that there is help out there under the stars. Helpful people that have gone through exactly what they just did — not having a clue what they’re doing. Looking back, I remember when I was one of those people, along with most of my astronomy buddies today, who went through the same thing the first time.
The Remedy: from time to time my friends and I advertise setting up our scopes out at the Heritage Park, next to Bolado Park, just south of Tres Pinos. There, we have minimum light pollution, and it is not that far from Hollister. What I’m suggesting is if you are one of those people that I just discussed, then bring your scope and family down to the park, and we’ll see if we can get you started on the right track with the fundamentals of your new scope and the night skies. After a couple of visits to the park, you and your whole family will feel a whole lot better about your dusty scope.
I hope everyone had a great holiday. Thanksgiving and Christmas are my two favorites. This Christmas, our whole family got together for the first time to take some group pictures. And guess where we met for our group photos? Well, the Historical Park of course. Though I couldn’t remember all their names, they all seemed to be nice people.
I hope this year is somewhat better than last year. Just be sure you think twice before you vote. There are some great choices out there; Republicans as well as Democrats, or maybe even a third-party candidate is the one. The main idea here is “Just Vote.” Who better to choose our president, the most powerful person in the world, than 100% of our voting population? You can’t complain then.
Clear skies…
Up and coming this month…
Jan. 1: Moon is at apogee (251,599 miles from Earth)
Jan. 2: Earth is at perihelion (91.4 million miles from the sun)
Jan. 3: Last Quarter Moon
Jan. 4: Quadrantids meteor shower peaks
Jan. 6: Venus passes 6° north of Antares
Jan. 8: Moon passes 0.8° north of Antares
Jan. 8: Moon passes 6° south of Venus
Jan. 9: Moon passes 7° south of Mercury
Jan. 10: Moon passes 4° south of Mars
Jan. 11: New Moon
Jan. 13: Moon is at perigee (225,102 miles from Earth)
Jan. 14: Moon passes 2° south of Saturn
Jan. 15: Moon passes 0.9° south of Neptune
Jan. 17: First Quarter Moon
Jan. 18: Moon passes 3° north of Jupiter
Jan. 19: Moon passes 3° north of Uranus
Jan. 25: Full Moon
Jan. 27: Mercury passes 0.2° north of Mars
Jan. 29: Moon is at apogee (252,138 miles from Earth)