The Art of Stargazing
By: Amy Dillon
Trying to find the Dearborn Observatory on a dismal Friday night in the dark of Evanston was like trying to find the star Arcturus in the Ursa Major Constellation. One winding road after the other passed by. Obscure street signs and random Northwestern University buildings seemed to topple beside me like dominoes. After pulling over twice trying to find Northwestern’s Dearborn Observatory, a place where every Friday night a large famous refractory telescope is open to the public, I finally found my way to the domed building hidden in the campus.
Welcome to the world of stargazing and astronomy. Stargazing is one of the oldest art forms of mankind. Many nights of the year, even people of the city can pull out lawn chairs or sit on the roofs of their apartment buildings and watch a lunar eclipse or a meteor shower. If you’ve had a rough day at work or school, why not sit outside and look at the craters of the moon through a reflecting telescope? Throughout this article you could learn a bit about stargazing to better enable yourself to discover the complexities of the universe and the beauty that accompanies them. You can do this through public organizations and buildings like observatories, where you can relax in the awe and beauty of stargazing with other people. Tour guides are happy to pass on the knowledge that accompanies what’s happening above the earth, while allowing you to use the observatory’s telescopes.
Even though we Chicagoans live in a major city with lots of light pollution (excessive artificial light) there are still some observatories open to the public. Northwestern’s Dearborn Observatory, for example, has only one intent; to be open to the public and serve anyone who has a thirst for astronomical knowledge. The Dearborn Observatory has a very interesting historical background, just as interesting as my experience of the observatory I had begun to let you in on from the beginning of my essay.
The Dearborn’s telescope went through a lot to stand were it is today. The lenses were made in 1862, according to Doctor Michael Smutko, Manager of telescope operations at the Dearborn Observatory of Northwestern, a teacher of physics and astronomy at Northwestern I had the pleasure of interviewing about astronomy and the observatory. The lenses were intended to be used at the University of Mississippi, while made in Boston. Because of the Civil War, the lenses had trouble making their way from Boston to Mississippi, so the lenses eventually ended up at the University of Chicago. Unfortunately, the University of Chicago, the old University of Chicago, back then, went bankrupt, and the lenses desperately needed a home. At that point, Northwestern took them in.
The Dearborn Observatory is also famous for its visit from the well-known scientist Edwin Hubble. What’s interesting is that Edwin Hubble not only attended a conference there, but this conference actually inspired him to do some of the research he is famous for regarding the idea that the universe is expanding and galaxies are moving away from each other. According to Dr. Smutko, the conference was of the American Astronomical Society. Hubble attended the conference while he was still a lowly graduate student at the University of Chicago. He listened in on a talk given by Professor Vesto Slipher. This professor came to discover, as said by Dr. Smutko, that, “ all of the galaxies that he had observed all seemed to be moving away from us. He didn’t see any that were moving toward us, and all these other ones were moving away from us. So Hubble thought this was a really interesting thing. Why would the galaxies move away from us like that? And that led him to pursue some of the work that he’s now famous for, discovering that the universe is indeed expanding and that galaxies really all are moving away from each other.” This puts the observatory on the map, although Dearborn doesn’t do any research anymore. It was possible in the earlier years, according to Dr. Smutko, but now because of present day conditions, its only use is for the enjoyment of the public. Every Friday the domed building opens its door to any patrons interested in looking through a huge refracting telescope with an 18.5 inch refracting lens. You may think, what a waste, but actually quite a number of Northwestern’s students also benefit from it. Dr. Smutko says of the observatory and its undergraduate and graduate tour guides, “…it’s an outstanding, world-class public outreach facility, and it’s also outstanding for training our students, our undergraduates and our undergraduate students, because, not only in learning how to use the telescope, but in learning how to use digital cameras, and image-processing techniques, our students can hands-on learn how to run our telescope and use our digital cameras, and they use the techniques that we teach them. Those techniques can be used at any observatory then around the world.” Therefore, these students get to learn how to use the equipment of the observatory, and they are prepared to take this knowledge with them anywhere. These students don’t have to be physics or astronomy majors either. They don’t have to be engineers or computer science majors. Theater, communication, and film majors make great tour guides at the observatory because they are such great communicators.
My visit to the Dearborn Observatory definitely gave me insight into the world of stargazing. I went by myself, but there were a fairly large variety of people waiting to be amazed by the cosmos. There were children, adults, senior citizens, a couple on a date, and some teenagers who looked like they were just looking for something fun to do on a Friday night. It was free, though there were donation envelopes next to the guestbook.
After trudging two flights of stairs and opening a heavy black door, a cool domed room surrounds you, with a huge tilted telescope in the center, something like the pupil of an eye. The room is dark except for surrounding red lights (their function is to give the room light without your eyes adjusting to it). The grad tour guide sits on a ladder leading up to the eyepiece of the telescope while both the grad and undergrad tour guides give their bit about the history and profile of the telescope. Questions erupt, camera lights flash. Another group noisily walks in. I prepare to leave, as it is cloudy and I expect to not be able to use the telescope. Then, the unexpected. The domed ceiling vibrates and opens up as a blanket of cold falls on us all. A cratered blue moon is seen through this refracting telescope by some twenty something novices. We all feel like astronomers by the end of the night.
To be sure, there are other observatories in Chicago that are open to the public. Northwestern’s Dearborn Observatory is accompanied in the Chicago land area by the Planetarium’s Doane Observatory, that has a twenty inch reflecting telescope, along with the telescope open to the public at the Ryerson Observatory at the University of Chicago.
Before venturing out into the world of stargazing, there are some things about it and astronomy that you should take with you. One, the basic types of telescopes: the refracting and the reflecting. Dr. Smutko defines the refracting telescope as one that uses lenses at both ends of the tube. There is the main lens, the larger lens at the front of the tube, the objective lens. Then there is the smaller lens at the back of the tube, to make up the eyepiece. The reflecting telescope, however, uses curved mirrors instead of lenses. In a reflecting telescope, there is a large mirror at the back of the telescope and the front surface is curved and light then bounces off of the curved surface of the mirror and it is focused to a point behind or off to the side of the telescope. This depends on the design. Which would you consider better, or more modern? According to Dr. Smutko, “It’s not that one’s more modern than the other, they’re just different approaches to doing the same kind of idea.”
Telescopes have many uses; for instance, this summer you can see Saturn, its rings, and its larger moons with a telescope. Constellations, groups of stars that have been given names, cover large parts of the sky, so that you can see them without a telescope. The International Astronomical Union named and abbreviated 88 constellations. Looking back on your boy or girl scout years, you may remember a ladle-shaped group of stars in the Ursa-Major (Great Bear) Constellation. The Constellation Orion (The Great Hunter) is another common constellation. The constellation Orion is intriguing because if you look up, he appears to be hunting his bordering constellation, Taurus the Bull.
Another point; try to stargaze away from artificial light. Light pollution, aforementioned, is the stargazer’s enemy. Street lights causes problems. The Dearborn telescope has its problems with city lights. Also, stargaze in open areas such as fields. If you don’t have the advantage of living in a rural area, an apartment rooftop is adequate.
As I walked out of the observatory, I took notice of how different Northwestern was from my school, DePaul University. I felt such a different vibe towards the campus and the energy, the field where a practice was being held, the layout of the buildings, and how unfamiliar everything seemed to me. Even though everything was really different, it was exciting and I had such a good experience there. On my home, I thought, isn’t this what stargazing is? Being amazed by the unfamiliar? If I could find a new Northwestern by looking into the sky every night this summer, I would. I hope this essay has inspired you to do so.
Source List
dictionary.reference.com/browse/constellation?s=t
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light_pollution
http://astro-observer.com/constellations/spring.html
http://chicago.straightdope.com/sdc20090806.php
http://ciera.northwestern.edu/observatory.php
http://skymean.com/planets/the-best-places-and-times-for-stargazing
http://space.about.com/od/stars/tp/brighteststars.html
http://www.ehow.com/info_7871606_common-constellations-found-sky.html
http://www.skyandtelescope.com/howto/basics/Constellation_Names.html
Interview with Doctor Michael Smutko- Manager of Telescope Operations at Northwestern University
Visit to the Dearborn Observatory at Northwestern University