Partly cloudy skies greeted visitors to the Cronyn Observatory Open House, Saturday, May 18th, 2013, 8:30 p.m. Graduate student Tyler Desjardins made the first of 2 digital slide presentations, “The Lives of Galaxies” to a small number of visitors while faculty member Dr. John de Bruyn took charge of the big 25.4cm refractor in the dome.
RASC London Centre was represented by Everett Clark, Dale Armstrong, Peter Jedicke and Bob Duff. Everett and Dale set up the London Centre’s 25.4cm Dobsonian and the Observatory’s 8-inch (20.3cm) Meade 2080/LX3 Schmidt-Cassegrain. Dale remained with the Schmidt-Cassegrain throughout the evening and showed visitors the Moon and Saturn using the 26mm Plossl (77X), the 12.5mm Ortho (160X) and the 20mm Plossl (100X) eyepieces. Bob and Peter used the 25.4cm Dobsonian to show visitors the Moon, using the 17mm Nagler (66X) eyepiece; Saturn, using the 12.5mm Ortho (89X) and 6mm Ortho (186X) eyepieces; and the star Spica and double stars Algieba (Gamma Leonis) and Castor.
Dr. John de Bruyn and Everett Clark operated the big 25.4cm refractor throughout the evening, showing visitors the Moon, using the 32mm Erfle (137X) eyepiece, and later both the Moon and Saturn using the 18mm Tele Vue Radian (244X) eyepieces.
Tyler made his second slide presentation to just 2 visitors who had previously been up in the dome. In all, there were a total of 29 visitors (including some children) who arrived throughout the evening. Everybody was very appreciative and the last visitors were gone by 11:10 p.m.
Bob Duff
Higher Education Liaison
RASC London Centre