Dumb All Over
A Little Ugly on the Side
During my high school days in the late seventies, I was chosen by my physics teacher to be one of a three-member team to study and photograph the full eclipse of the sun. We were to travel from Denver to a high school in Wolf Point, Montana, and conduct our experiments there.
I remember well the telescope we were using; a newtonian Questar reflector with a camera attachment. It was a fine instrument. I think the mirror was about three and a half inches in diameter and was encased in a small, compact, easy-to-transport tube. It was not too unsimilar to Isaac Newton's first telescope in overall size.
We trained and practiced quite a bit. I remember going over and over the two and a half minute choreography necessary to accomplish the task. We even had a contengency plan for cloudy and overcast skies. Our physics teacher had reserved a small private plane to fly us above the clouds so that we might point the telescope out of the plane window and obtain our photographs that way. We practiced this. One early Saturday morning, the team showed up at a small local airstrip and two of us were flown around until we obtained some results. They weren't great results, but at least we knew the procedure was theoretically possible. After months of practice, we were prepared and ready to go. Then my high school choir director stepped in and gummed up the works.
The choir teacher said a concert was scheduled for one of the days we were to be in Wolf Point. I explained to him why it would be necessary for me to be excused from the concert. He did not agree and said my letter grade for the semester would be lowered if I did not show up.
Hindsight being 20/20, if I could relive those few months in 1979, I would tell that choir director to go screw himself. I did not do so then and, instead, had to tell my physics teacher that I had to bow out of the project. I thought it was the right thing to do. (Most choir concert dates, including the one mentioned, were not scheduled until well after the beginning of the semester.)
I have regretted my decision ever since and, as yet, have never witnessed a full eclipse of the sun.
Which brings me to the present. Ever since those high school days, I have been looking for the most plausible opportunity to witness one of these indescribable events. August 21, 2017, has always been on my radar. Early on, my plan was to be somewhere near the point of greatest totality, somewhere in Kentucky, IIRC. But living in Denver and knowing that the shadow's path will travel directly through Casper, Wyoming, I can easily live without the few extra seconds of totality that people will see in Kentucky. I'm going to Casper.
Last year after studying the shadow's path in detail, I noticed the path would go right through the bottom section of the Casper Golf Club. I thought to myself, "Gee, wouldn't it be great to witness this thing from the nicely manicured greens of the golf course?" I emailed them and said I would pay money to sit on the course and be an observer that day. They were unaware the path was going to pierce the course. They told me that by 2017, the golf course would be administered by a different Board of Directors than it is at present. They said it would be up to the future Board to decide if they would open the greens to the general public on August 21, 2017. They thanked me for the info and told me to contact them again in a few years.
Additionally, the path goes through the southern portion of Casper College nearest the McMurry Career Studies Center building. I believe this will be my "ground zero". Yes, I will be there that day between the hours of 11 a.m. and noon. And no two-bit choir director will stop me.
I will be there. Will you?
I remember well the telescope we were using; a newtonian Questar reflector with a camera attachment. It was a fine instrument. I think the mirror was about three and a half inches in diameter and was encased in a small, compact, easy-to-transport tube. It was not too unsimilar to Isaac Newton's first telescope in overall size.
We trained and practiced quite a bit. I remember going over and over the two and a half minute choreography necessary to accomplish the task. We even had a contengency plan for cloudy and overcast skies. Our physics teacher had reserved a small private plane to fly us above the clouds so that we might point the telescope out of the plane window and obtain our photographs that way. We practiced this. One early Saturday morning, the team showed up at a small local airstrip and two of us were flown around until we obtained some results. They weren't great results, but at least we knew the procedure was theoretically possible. After months of practice, we were prepared and ready to go. Then my high school choir director stepped in and gummed up the works.
The choir teacher said a concert was scheduled for one of the days we were to be in Wolf Point. I explained to him why it would be necessary for me to be excused from the concert. He did not agree and said my letter grade for the semester would be lowered if I did not show up.
Hindsight being 20/20, if I could relive those few months in 1979, I would tell that choir director to go screw himself. I did not do so then and, instead, had to tell my physics teacher that I had to bow out of the project. I thought it was the right thing to do. (Most choir concert dates, including the one mentioned, were not scheduled until well after the beginning of the semester.)
I have regretted my decision ever since and, as yet, have never witnessed a full eclipse of the sun.
Which brings me to the present. Ever since those high school days, I have been looking for the most plausible opportunity to witness one of these indescribable events. August 21, 2017, has always been on my radar. Early on, my plan was to be somewhere near the point of greatest totality, somewhere in Kentucky, IIRC. But living in Denver and knowing that the shadow's path will travel directly through Casper, Wyoming, I can easily live without the few extra seconds of totality that people will see in Kentucky. I'm going to Casper.
Last year after studying the shadow's path in detail, I noticed the path would go right through the bottom section of the Casper Golf Club. I thought to myself, "Gee, wouldn't it be great to witness this thing from the nicely manicured greens of the golf course?" I emailed them and said I would pay money to sit on the course and be an observer that day. They were unaware the path was going to pierce the course. They told me that by 2017, the golf course would be administered by a different Board of Directors than it is at present. They said it would be up to the future Board to decide if they would open the greens to the general public on August 21, 2017. They thanked me for the info and told me to contact them again in a few years.
Additionally, the path goes through the southern portion of Casper College nearest the McMurry Career Studies Center building. I believe this will be my "ground zero". Yes, I will be there that day between the hours of 11 a.m. and noon. And no two-bit choir director will stop me.
I will be there. Will you?
