Rob JaworskiWith much sadness, we must report that the National Park Service advised us that the annual Yosemite star party, what we call _Stars Over Yosemite_, has been canceled for 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. We would certainly look forward to next year, but due to planned construction and upgrades in the park, the management has canceled the program for 2021 as well.
Read their letter here: Link
Rob Jaworski
Gerry smiling happily with his hobby.
SJAA President and friend Gerry Joyce passed away recently. Gerald James Joyce (Gerry) was born on November 2, 1945 and passed away on May 20, 2020. He was 74 years old.
Gerry was born in Long Branch, New Jersey, the youngest of four boys and the son of Norwegian immigrants Frank and Ruth Joyce. After a three-year stint with the Navy, he married his first wife, Nancy, and began a 50-year career in computer technology. Over his lifetime, Gerry worked with both large and small companies, but had a particular “soft spot” for the challenges of startups. He was an innovator in the early days of computers; his natural curiosity, thirst for learning, and tenacity took him through many phases of his career. His entrepreneurial spirit brought him to California in the late 70’s. In 1999 he married Priscilla Dutton, and on November 6, 2019 they celebrated their 20th anniversary in Kauai, Hawaii. Gerry and Priscilla traveled extensively, including a trip to Norway to reacquaint with relatives. In 2004, he started his own company, Viking Systems, to design and install all forms of home automation. He sold Viking in 2016 and retired.
During the last four years, Gerry was able to pursue a life-long interest in astronomy and astrophotography. In early 2020 he became President of the San Jose Astronomical Association. Prior to that, he had also served as the Vice-President of SJAA from October 2019 to March 2020. His excitement was contagious – he was always on a mission to interest everyone – from grandchildren to casual acquaintances – in the wonders of the sky. SJAA enriched Gerry’s retirement years immeasurably, and he made many dear friends during his time with the club.
Gerry is survived by his wife Priscilla, sons Stephen (Briana), Eric (Lisa), and David (Teri), step son Steve Wallace (Dana), step daughter Erin Wallace, grandchildren Vendela, Karsten and Chloe, and step grandchildren Jonas, Cora, Kelsey and Adelyn.
In lieu of flowers, please donate in his name to the Humane Society of Silicon Valley or Second Harvest Food Bank of Silicon Valley. A private memorial service was held on June 6, 2020.
If you would like to share any memory or thoughts or pictures of Gerry with the rest of the SJAA community, please do so in the comments. All messages will be shared with Gerry’s family.
Gerry with a collection of SJAA folks February 2020.
Rob JaworskiIn normal years, the SJAA Swap Meet is held in the spring and again in the fall. This is a great social outlet, but unfortunately, due to all that’s happening with the pandemic this year, the SJAA leadership had to make the difficult decision to postpone it. It may reappear later in the sprint or summer, but depending on how things go, like a comet in an irregular orbit, it might not show up again until the fall. Please keep an eye on the SJAA Meetup site for up-to-date information regarding all SJAA events.
In other news, the SJAA tech team is looking for methods to preserve talks and presentations from board and general meetings. They are also in the process of finding ways to provide video conferencing to replace having meetings at Houge Park which the City of San Jose has closed. Again, keep an eye on the Meetup for the latest, and best practices indicate you should RSVP to any Meetup event so that you can get notifications (via Meetup email) when an event is changed or has updated info from the organizer.
Rob JaworskiEach February and March sees board elections and officer elections, respectively. Here are the results of the 2020 elections.
For the board of directors, four director seats were up for elections. All four incumbents ran for those seats and were re-elected: Sandy Mohan (board seat 2), Wolf Witt (seat 4), Glenn Newell (seat 8) and Rob Jaworski (seat 6). Congratulations to them all, and more importantly, a hearty Thank You to them for their service.
Things were a bit more exciting at the March officer elections. As you may know, officers are elected to one-year terms and all of them, with one exception, have no limit to the number of terms that can be served by one individual. That exception is the President role, which has a term limit of just two years.
First, let us give Swami Nigam a round of recognition for his service as President for the past two years. Though he has stayed busy with his work and family life, he somehow still made time for leading our organization. Replacing him is Gerry Joyce, who most recently served as Vice President.
Two of the remaining three officer positions also had a change: Ken Miura is now the Vice President, and Emi Nikolov took over the reigns as the organization’s Secretary. Rounding out the fourth position is incumbent Rob Jaworski, who remains the club’s Treasurer.
Another shout out to our past, current and new Directors and Officers! Now in our 66th year, we couldn’t keep on going without volunteers who step up to keep the club going and continuing its mission of bringing astronomy and science to the people!
Rob Jaworski
San Jose Astronomical Association is closely monitoring the coronavirus/COVID-19 situation in Santa Clara county. In accordance with advisement from Santa Clara County Health Department we may be canceling some events in the next few weeks, as appropriate – especially those that involve close contact and shared surface on telescopes. Please check the SJAA Meetup group to determine if an event has been canceled before heading out to the event. The board will periodically review the status of the outbreak and the guidance from the Santa Clara county to determine the impact upon upcoming events.
Rob JaworskiAt the end of this year, 2019, the San Jose Astronomical Association is celebrating its sixty fifth birthday. For us mere mortals, sixty five is traditionally the age at which we retire, quit our decades -long journey of work and getting things done, and finally look forward to hopefully another couple of decades of rest and relaxation. I don’t see the same thing for the SJAA.
The mission of the SJAA is to bring astronomy and science to the public, to inspire curiosity and to provide a place to go when an interest in space or astronomy (or geology or chemistry or any kind of science) is kindled. In these short-attention-span times, it seems that NASA missions (to the moon or Mars!) or rare celestial events (the recent Great American Eclipse of 2017!) or the sight of rocket launches (except maybe for SpaceX launches) don’t have the heft to inspire the awe that they once did.
I submit that something about those events being viewed on a high definition, but really small screen, and the number of times that it’s possible to view them, causes dilution of the experience, and dilution of the awe.
The handful of volunteers who run SJAA know that the awe is still there. The awe has been instilled deep within them, and they know there are seeds of that awe hibernating in others. Those seeds want to grow, but it’s not easy for them to germinate. Too many distractions, too many choices on what to do. But despite all that, SJAA volunteers continue to give their time to provide that place, either in the lecture hall or out at a dark hilltop, so the seed can be provided what it needs to grow into a healthy interest and inquiry in the world around us and beyond.
In the sixty five years since a small group of neighbors got together to create this special interest group, a few years before Sputnik and well before Apollo 11, there have been thousands of kids and grown-ups (and kids that turned into grown-ups), who have availed themselves of what SJAA has to offer. They may have come to listen to a professional astronomer talk about her research into the origin of galaxies. Or they may have come to borrow a telescope from the long-running Telescope Loaner program. Or they simply wanted to bring their kids out into the local night sky and show them what Mars or Saturn, or even just the moon, looks like up close and personal. Most of those people had a fleeting, momentary experience with the SJAA. Some of them became members for a period of time before interests shifted and they moved on. Still others, like a few I can name off the top of my head, stuck around for decades as members (and are still around, as members). And some members took the next step and donated the most precious of assets, their time. They became volunteers because they loved what they were learning and wanted to share it with others.
Since the SJAA is entirely a volunteer -run organization, we are always on the lookout for more members to participate. Attending events as a member of the public (or a member of SJAA) is good and very much appreciated. Participating and helping out is even better! Whatever your skills or strengths, you can help make a difference. Come to an event, talk to any board member of someone “in charge”, and they can tell you more. It can be uncomfortable at first, but you’ll soon find that it’s a great experience. It’s what you make it.
Sixty five years is a long time for a non-profit organization to exist. Although the SJAA is not a very well known staple of the south bay, a staple it is and we are proud that a steady stream of newcomers discovers the club and works to keep it going. We are thankful to those who bring new energy to the club along with their excitement to share the heavens with others. We are thankful to the City of San Jose for providing a place to call our basecamp. We are thankful that the SJAA has been here since 1954, and we will work to keep it going for another 65 years!
With respect,
Rob Jaworski
Treasurer, past President and board member
Rob JaworskiFor the ninth straight year, the SJAA hosted a booth, and lots of solar scopes, at San Jose’s District 9 community fair called Celebrate Cambrian. This event took place on Sunday, 26 August 2018.
This area of San Jose is known as Cambrian Park, and features the Cambrian Community Center, which is situation on the grounds of the former Camden High School campus. SJAA volunteers maintain a presence at this annual event to contribute back to the community in which our organization has its basecamp at Houge Park.
As a member of this local community, I have spearheaded all of SJAA’s participation in the event. It’s essentially a solar viewing event, so Wolf Witt, our new leader of the Solar Program, again stepped up to help with the event. We showcased three solar scopes, the club’s flagship Lunt 100mm H-alpha scope, a recently donated Lunt 80mm, and Wolf’s personal Celestron. The 80mm rig was outfitted with a Mallincam camera which was wired to an outdoor-rated flat panel display to more easily show visitors what they will see in the eyepiece of the other two scopes. And finally, we had Wolf’s Lunt 60 on his Celestron NexStar mount.
The sun helped us by hosting a couple of interesting features. There was a fairly large prominence at the four o’clock position which showed up nicely on the monitor and in the eyepiece. The sun also displayed a nice filament across the face of its disk, again easily spotted in the scopes and through the camera. One of the posters of the sun that we had out there coincidentally
mimicked what we could see in the eyepiece, with the prominence at the 4 o’clock position and the location of the filament. Talk about cooperation!
We had a great group of volunteers manning the scopes and the booth. Our new social media manager, Jessica Johnson (who recently got SJAA on Instagram!), was doing a great job guiding the visitors through the scopes.
We had another young lady helping all day, a high school student who is in the process of forming a new astronomy club at her school. We had two more high school students manning the booth and helping kids and their parents learn about ultraviolet light by making bracelets out of UV-sensitive beads. The beads were a hit, with oohs and ahhs all around once the beads quickly developed color when exposed to sunlight!
Bill Gottlieb also participated, helping explain aspects of what we were viewing. SJAA President Swami Nigam also paid a visit to ensure things were running smoothly.
Thanks to our volunteers who gave up most of their Sunday to help bring astronomy to the general public. We’ll be out there again next year!
Rob Jaworski
At the board of directors meeting, July 2017, the board voted to amend the bylaws. This kind of move is not done very often, and great consideration is made before such an idea is even brought to a vote by the board. However, given the history of the types of memberships with the SJAA, and also some recent moves made by the City of San Jose, the board deemed it prudent to amend the bylaws to remove the option of offering youth or student memberships, and to stipulate that only people age 18 and above are able to apply for membership.
Specifically, the board voted to remove Article 12, Section 1, Part C in its entirety. Further, Article 12, Section 2 was amended to indicate only people 18 and over can be members.
Over the past seven or eight years during which I have been on the board of the SJAA, I have served as membership chair at least twice. Also, at every board meeting each month, the membership report lists all those individuals who have applied for new or renewing membership. Plainly, there is a good amount of visibility of the member rolls. During those years, I have seen not more than a small handful of members who applied via the student/youth membership. The number has been, at most, in the single digits.
Recently, we have seen the City of San Jose put forth some requirements which could be quite burdensome to SJAA volunteers. In the recent requalification process that the City required of its reuse partners (of which, SJAA is one), it called for all volunteers or employees that has direct contact with minors to have background checks run, TB tests completed, fingerprints taken, and all the other things that typically come with interacting with children. On the face of it, everyone in the club that shows up to In Town Star Parties or Solar Sundays, or any of the myriad events that the SJAA hosts at Houge Park, could be considered a volunteer that has potential interaction with children. It would be too much to ask of SJAA volunteers to agree to such a requirement, and it could potentially put the events at Houge Park at risk.
Upon further research and investigation, the board concluded that although the contract with the City does not provide a definition of direct contact, generally, volunteers of SJAA do not have direct contact. Rather, SJAA volunteers have incidental contact with minors. Kids may show up to SJAA events with their parents or guardians, but SJAA volunteers never take custody of or supervise them, such as in an afterschool or day care environment. The conclusion was made that since no one that is associated with SJAA ever has direct contact with minors, the organization is exempt from such requirements.
To further solidify the fact that SJAA does not provide care, supervision, guidance or control of minors in any way, the board thought it prudent that minors be prohibited from becoming members in the first place.
The board does not believe that these changes to the bylaws will have any impact whatsoever to its members, now or in the future. SJAA will recognize the benefit, however, of not being potentially held to onerous requirements of its volunteers, nor will there be any question about the club’s relationship to minors. The club certainly encourages kids of all ages to learn more about astronomy and the sciences and to come to club events, and SJAA will continue to support kids’s desires to learn more, or to just look at Saturn through a telescope. But please, do bring a parent or guardian!
Image by of Flickr user Ryan Leong (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
Rob Jaworski
On behalf of the San Jose Astronomical Association, I am pleased to announce the recipient of the 2016 A. B. Gregory Award. The award is a plaque which reads “In Recognition of Outstanding Contributions of Time and Effort to Others in Amateur Astronomy”, and I can think of no one in the SJAA who deserves it more than Paul Mancuso. Rob JaworskiEach February, the SJAA hosts its annual membership meeting, where about half of the members of the nine seat board of directors are elected by the members, recognition awards are presented, and everyone brings something to share for the annual potluck.
Lee Hoglan was one of the three deserving recipients of recognition. Before Lee stepped down from the board late last year, he had served for over ten years; he was the longest serving board member in recent memory and stood as vice president for many years. He also managed the Telescope Loaner Program for many years, and was the face of SJAA on the website, in the ‘Ask Lee’ role. For many years, he was also a reliable opener and closer for the In Town Star Parties at San José’s Houge Park. Though he wasn’t there that night to receive the award, he was certainly there in spirit, as everyone, recent members and long timers alike, became just a little bit more aware of his significant contributions.
Ed Wong also received recognition for his work with the club. A board member for several years, Ed also spearheaded several new initiatives that continue today. The idea of Fix It sessions came from Ed, who ran the program for several years before handing it off to others. He also was instrumental in working with the Santa Clara County Parks Department for a permit which allowed nighttime use of Mendoza Ranch, one of the darker sky sites in the south bay. He also established and maintains the relationship with Pinnacles National Park, organizing amateur astronomers from the south bay to participate in public star parties at the National Park, with the idea of being able to use the park on other nights for ‘private’ viewing. He was a docent with the Santa Clara County Open Space Authority and also continues to run the SJAA Binocular Observing program.
Dave Ittner was the final recipient of recognition by the club at the February meeting. Dave has an unending reservoir of energy, which he applied for almost too many roles and leadership positions in the club to even name. Most recently, he was president for the past two years before bing termed out. He was a lead docent with the OSA, managing the Starry Nights program at Rancho Cañada del Oro, south of San José. He ran the loaner program and continues to manage the stream of incoming donations of astronomy gear. Most significantly, the QuickSTARt program was his brainchild. QuickSTARt probably does more to help facilitate new people into the hobby of amateur astronomy than any other, and goes a long way to fulfill the club’s mission of brining astronomy to the public. Dave continues to singlehandedly run this program.
Congratulations, and perhaps more appropriately, Thank You, to Lee, Ed and Dave for the well-deserved recognition they received and for their commitment of energy and time to the local amateur astronomy community.
(For more on the happenings of the 2017 membership meeting, including pictures, please see the cover story in the March 2017 edition of the Ephemeris.)
Rob ChapmanHello SJAA Members,
Winter is here and along with the long nights comes SJAA Board Member elections! This year we have 6 seats that will be opening up at the end of this year’s term. Only 3 current board members are running for re-election, so that means we are looking for at least 3 enthusiastic SJAA members to help out. What exactly is expected of an SJAA board member? Well to be honest, not very much:
And that is it! If you want to be a program director or a member of the executive staff, you are more than welcome to offer to take on the extra responsibility, but board members are not required to do so.
Rob Jaworski
This is a site report, not so much an observing report. My main goal was to go to check out the surroundings. On July 30-31 2016, I went to Williams Hill Recreation Area, managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), to investigate the suitability of the site for purposes of astronomical observing, with the possibility of spending the night. The area is located about 27 road miles, or 17 miles as the crow flies, south of King City.
My plan was to get there earlier in the day on Saturday with my dirt bike, and then tool around to explore and get to know the area, and settling on a location where I could set up my scope. I would then have dinner, and head to that site to set up, and wait for night to fall. Things went very much according to plan.
One hundred miles of this kind of view.
The ride down 101 was uneventful, though slow going getting out of Santa Clara County due to Gilroy’s annual Garlic Festival. Getting through Prunedale and Salinas was also slow in spots, and much of the afternoon sky was obscured by smoke from the fire near Carmel (prevailing winds were taking the smoke northeast, thankfully away from my destination). It was over a hundred miles on southbound 101, through all the towns we know when we are traveling to dark sky sites: Gonzales, Soledad, Greenfield, King City.
About eight miles of white dusty dirt road.
The exit to take is called San Ardo, then a right onto Paris Valley Road. After a little less than two miles of paved farm road, you have to make a sharp left turn onto Lockwood San Ardo Road, at which point, it turns to a fairly well maintained dirt road. Once on the dirt, going was slow. I had a trailer so I took it easy, no more than 25, and in some places, 10 or less toward the top. Nearing the camp, the road is cut into the side of the hill, exposing the Monterey shale formations. It’s a very dry, dusty white ride.
Once you see this sign, you know you’ve made it!
The actual Williams Hill, where all the antenna towers are. It’s four and a half miles past the campground.
I arrived at the campground closer to 4pm, about ninety minutes later than I originally planned. The first order of business was to unhitch the trailer and pull the bike down, getting ready for the first phase, local exploration. The campground is four and a half miles before the end of the road that leads up to the actual Williams Hill, which can also rightly be called Antenna Hill. I made my way to antenna hill via the fairly well maintained dirt road comprised mainly of switchbacks that lead from one hill to the next. At the top of the hill, the antennae live behind a chain link fence, some of the towers more securely enclosed than others, possibly giving away their importance to their owners. At the end of the road, there is a fairly wide area that may be suitable to set up maybe a dozen scopes, but it’s a long way to go past the campground, there are large circles etched into the ground by spinning wheels (ie, donuts), and if anyone were to come up that road at night, you’d be blasted with headlights with little to no cover. Further, the flat area, though wide open at the top of the hill with nice horizons (except for the towers), is not entirely level. Being the top of a hill, it has a mild crown, I thought to myself that this area would do in a pinch, but there very well could be better sites.
Lots and lots and lots of spent shotgun shells littered every turnout.
I kept exploring and found miles of more trails on this BLM land. North of the campground area, ie, north of Lockwood San Ardo Road, there are plenty of possible observing sites with decent horizons and plenty of space for plenty of astronomers’ vehicles and their gear. Many, most or all of them were littered with spent shotgun shells. It was shameful, how the shooters left such a mess. There weren’t too many targets, and thankfully not much broken glass, though a gallon size fire extinguisher appeared to be on the receiving end of a muzzle. After a good hour and a half of exploring, I concluded that the best overall site for observing is only about half mile from the campground, at 35.984279, -121.011742. It’s an open hill good with horizons nearly all the way around, especially to the east. So much so that you can look down and see headlights on highway 101. After dark, there was just a small light dome to the east, Paso Robles, perhaps. (EDIT: I was informed this light dome is not Paso Robles, which is way more to the south, and there is nothing east; this is most likely skyglow.)
The campground is wooded with pines, though sparsely, and each of the six sites are far enough apart which provides for privacy. The location is on top of a ridge, so the wind was sailing briskly over the ridge top, making tent assembly a bit difficulty. However, it died down rather abruptly after about 7pm.
The campsite showing fire ring, canopy, picnic table.
There is no water at the campground whatsoever, so any campers or other visitors are well advised to bring plenty of their own. There is a single vault toilet that was fairly (relatively) clean and even stocked with adequate amounts of TP. The sites each had a metal picnic table and a canopy as shelter from the sun, or perhaps the rain, and the sites and much of the rest of the campground were roped off to keep offroaders off the vegetation.
There were other campers, including a fairly large group of young men, in about 6 cars. They were not any problem, we didn’t socialize at all, and the smell of clove cigarettes adorned the air on the road leading away from camp. There was also a later arrival, a guy with his girlfriend, out for a romantic camp getaway in the local hills.
As far as observing, I don’t have much to write about. The hilltop location were I set up was mildly rutted by vehicles turning around when the ground was last wet. The ruts made it slightly challenging to find an adequately flat, level spot for the dob base. It wasn’t dusty there, but rather a bit rocky with small scrub growing low. After it got dark, I sampled Saturn, whose tilt is now so great that seeing the Cassini division is easy, and enjoyed the planets wandering through Scorpius. viewed some objects around Ophiucus but mainly I was happy just taking in the dark sky, with the milky way hanging above like fluffy clouds. A few streaks of light appeared during the night, perhaps a pre-game show for the coming Perseid meteor shower. It was very much plenty dark.
The view of the road leading up to Williams Hill Recreation Area, from the top, looking east.
I didn’t stay out long since I had to be out of there early. The next morning, I loaded up and took it easy down the hill again, and it was a nicer ride since it wasn’t as hot. Got back to San Jose around 11am.
Would I recommend this place for SJAA members to go observing? Definitely yes. The recommendation would also include that you should plan on staying the night. Though there is no water and no trash service, and it’s a fairly remote location where shooting is allowed, it does have fairly decent cell service, a nice campground, and good horizons at 2200 feet (671 meters).
Smoke from the fire near Carmel, California.
Rob’s camp in the sunset.
An overnight visitor, clinging to the ceiling of the tent.
Afternoon wind whipped up a section of thick white dust at the one tight hairpin turn.
Rob JaworskiHello SJAA Members and Friends,
Just a reminder that the SJAA Swap Meet is happening this Sunday, March 20, 2016 at the Hall at San Jose’s Houge Park. Here is the announcement that went to the Announce list (which is still being used, we encourage people to join), and here is the Meetup for the event (we encourage RSVPs!).
It’s important to note that the official start time is noon. That’s when the doors will open for business. For those of us who will be selling items, the hall will be available as early as 11am for people to come and set up their wares, for instance, if you have full scopes to bring in and set up for display. We are discouraging any buying and selling to happen during that “setup” hour, just so we stay true to the official opening time of 12 noon.
If you plan to sell items, please be aware that you will be asked to read and sign a form, which have a few guidelines. I’ve included them below so you can review them ahead of time, and it’s not new to you when you arrive.
We’re expecting a fun and sociable event. See you Sunday!
Teruo UtsumiI’ve dubbed our automation effort GUS: Grand Unified SJAA. (This is a continuation from the post in May. If you’re interested in pitching in or just curious, you’re invited to join the Coders group.)
The organizers spend hundreds of man hours every year, so to streamline our various processes, we’ve started the task of automating our major operations:
We’re also looking to automate management of the various tasks associated with each of our events.
Coders is currently made up of about a dozen people. We’d like to extend our appreciation for all Coders for their participation and help. Special thanks to:
We’ll have updates as we hit future milestones. We’re just getting started, but the system might end up looking something like this:
Rob JaworskiLast Saturday night was the annual membership meeting of the SJAA. There was a potluck, awards, and the annual election for about half the seats of the board of directors. Bill O’Neil, Glenn Newell, Rob Jaworski and Dave Ittner were all up for reelection, and we are happy to report all nominees, all of which are incumbents, were reelected to another two year term by the membership. Each candidate received 24 votes in favor and zero against.
Congratulations to all the candidates! The SJAA membership and the broader amateur astronomy community appreciate your service to this important educational institution serving the south bay and beyond!
This is my long due blog post…but better late than never!
I am excited to announce that thanks to a very generous donation to SJAA library, we now have some more great books in store for members to check out. Here’s the list –
The First Three Minutes
The Red Limit
Black Holes and Warped Spacetime
Galaxies and Quasars
Sundials – Their Theory And Construction
The Milky Way
Space Shots
Comets
Cosmology + 1
Astrophotography II
Astrophotography
Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory Star Catalog – Part 1 to 4
The Astronomical Almanac – 1990 to 2000
Telescope Optics
As you can tell by the book titles, the central idea is to try to reach out all our readers by keeping variety of books and DVDs in our collection. In addition to these, we also have lots of books suitable for kids and young adults. I would highly encourage you all to check them out!
I would also like to take this opportunity to let our readers know that due to limited space, we have decided to give away most of our magazines collection. If there are any particular issues you are interested in, don’t hesitate to reach out to me at librarian.sjaa@gmail.com. You can find the current collection at SJAA Magazines.
If you have any suggestions/comments about SJAA library program, I can be reached at librarian.sjaa@gmail.com
Happy reading!
Sukhada
Rob Jaworski
image credit Glenn Newell
The SJAA Swap Meet for 2015 was a resounding success! There were lots of people who came out to browse, buy and sell, with old friends meeting up for the first time in a long while.
Though the event was scheduled to start at 11AM, there were people showing up even before then, setting up their wares, and others who came early to snag the good deals on pieces and parts of astronomy gear they needed. It was quite evident that this event was long anticipated. And just as it started early, it also ended early. Advertised to shut down at 4pm, the swap meet really began winding down at about 2pm, with people having socialized enough, sorting through the gear plenty enough times, and feeling satisfied that everything, and everyone, who was going to show up had already done so. The hall was cleaned out and cleaned up by 2:30.
Throughout the year, the SJAA receives donations of astronomy gear, usually sets of full telescope rigs with all the accessories. These donations are evaluated to determine if there is a place for it in a club program, such as the loaner telescope program. If there is no suitable place for it, then it’s value on the secondary market is determined, and finally gets listed for sale at either the annual swap meeting or auction. At this year’s swap meet, the club was able to find new homes for quite a number of gently and otherwise used scopes and accessories. Including direct sales and donations of sales proceeds from participants, the SJAA netted about $2300 at the end of the day.
The club very much appreciates all donations, and the board of directors also very much appreciates the time and effort of the volunteers that make these events happen, including the prep work of receiving donations, evaluating them, and finally finding them new homes. The community of amateur astronomy enthusiasts makes it all work.
We look forward to the next swap meet and seeing faces that sometimes become less and less frequent in the hall at Houge or on the hills in the dark of a new moon. We hope we can continue to encourage people to get out, to observe, and to keep this wonderful community and hobby going.
If you attended the swap meet and have any feedback for the organizers, please use the Feedback link on the sjaa website. Even if you didn’t attend but want to share an idea or any thoughts, please send it via the same means.
Rob Jaworski
I just got back from a holiday in northern Australia. Though it wasn’t an astronomical vacation at all (brought no scopes or astronomical meaningful binocs), I did get a chance to look up at a far more southern sky than I’m used to seeing.
The trip was a family vacation to tropical northern Queensland, specifically, Port Douglas and Cairns, so we were mostly between 16.5 and 17 degrees south latitude, definitely in the tropics, but not all that far south.
The first thing that I noticed was how high Scorpius is at that latitude. It’s practically overhead, along with the teapot, with the Milky Way running pretty much between the two. While shielding my view from the bright and numerous resort lights, the sky was still noticeably dark, which allowed the Milky Way to be so visible. What also stood out was a splotch of fuzz between the scorpion tail and the teapot spout, which is known as the open star cluster M7. It was very bright, very noticeable with the naked eye.
After I got over my fascination of how high these summer, er, winter constellations were, I turned my focus to the unknown area just below Scorpius (would that be south or Scorpius, or maybe south west?). It was entirely unfamiliar, and I knew that was a completely new area of the sky that I’ve never seen before. That was a really cool feeling, knowing that I was looking at something I’ve never seen before, something I can’t see from home because it’s over and beyond my familiar horizon.
Checking the southern hemisphere sky map (thanks for sending it, Ed!), I realized that it was mostly Centaurus that occupied that space. This constellation, according to Wikipedia, is visible only up to about 25 degrees north. Its two brightest stars, alpha (yes, *that* Alpha Centauri), and beta, which, btw, are unmistakably bright, point directly to Crux, the southern cross. Crux is recognizable as a cross, and the “fifth” star of the cross that’s depicted in Australia’s national flag, though readily apparent in the sky, isn’t all that noteworthy. I would opine that it could easily have been left out of their flag and ensigns. I have to go with New Zealand (and a few others) on this one.
The other constellations I identified were the southern crown (Corona Australis) and Triangulum Australe.
After doing a couple of brief (ten or fifteen minute) naked eye observation sessions over a few days, I wanted to see if there was anyone local that I could meet up with to get a better tour, possibly a telescopic one, of the views from sixteen degrees south. Turns out that there is an astronomy group in Cairns, but unfortunately, emails to their listed address went unanswered while I was there.
Of course I wish that I had brought some gear and prepared better for this visit to the south, but I have to remind myself that I went in knowing that this was not going to be an astronomy focused trip. The scuba diving at the Great Barrier Reef, visiting the rainforest as far north as Cape Tribulation, and avoiding the pademelons, wallabies and kangaroos on the road at dusk kept me busy. It’s a really interesting area of Australia to visit, where the rainforest meets the reef, as they say, and the lack of astronomy during this visit only gives me an excuse to go there again, perhaps further south, so that the Magellanic Clouds can also be bagged!
Dave IttnerDear SJAA Member,
The San Jose Astronomical Association (SJAA) has been in existence for 60 years now. For many of those years, the club has offered its members the benefit of subscribing to Sky & Telescope magazine when they join or renew their membership. Due to the significant growth of the club, and issues beyond our control, we have determined that the club can no longer continue this service.
We are facing a number of challenges that directly affect our ability to offer this service. For example:
– Long lead times – the process is very manual which also involves sending a letter via US Mail to the publisher on the east coast.
– Renewal offers – the publisher begins sending renewal notices soon after receiving the subscription, which can be confusing to the subscriber.
– Better offers – many times, the renewal offers are a better deal for the subscriber than the rates the SJAA can offer.
– Manual process – processing the subscriptions is a manual process, which takes quite a bit of valuable volunteer time, especially when there are hiccups in the process.
– Not a fundraiser – the SJAA usually loses a little bit of money with each subscription, which not only makes this service not a fundraiser, but a slight drain on resources.
Many of our members have reported that it is actually better to subscribe/renew directly with S&T as they receive a lower price and significantly faster service. One outside service that offers a deeper discount is via the Astronomy Society of the Pacific. You can subscribe to S&T, Astronomy Magazine, and StarDate Magazine from this page:
http://www.astrosociety.org/magazine/
Another publication that out members are finding of great interest is Astronomy Technology Today. This magazine focuses on astronomy equipment, gear and technology, more so than S&T or Astronomy magazines. ATT offers a discount to SJAA members.
https://www.astronomytechnologytoday.com/
Please email Ed Wong, the Membership Coordinator, at sjaamemberships@gmail.com for the discount code.
The many downsides listed above, along with the available alternatives, have helped us make the decision to suspend offering the S&T subscription service. For those of you who have taken advantage of this service over the years, we regret not being able to continue, but we are confident you can get a better variety, better service, and at a better price, by going with the alternatives mentioned above.
Our club relies on volunteers who generously donate their time in support of all club activities, and the board thanks all of them for the most valuable contributions they can make, which is their time.
Thank you for your understanding and continued support.
Regards,
Dave Ittner
President
SJAA
Rob Jaworski
The SJAA is in the process of automating various aspects of club operations. Examples include subscribing (and unsubscribing) to email lists, renewing memberships, maintaining event calendars, creating and adapting an auction system, and lots more. We are forming a team whose mission will be to identify these needs, prioritize them, projectize them, and tackle them. These are essentially software development, implementation and integration projects.
A kickoff meeting has been scheduled to get this started.
Event: SJAA Coders Inaugural Meeting
Place: Houge Park, Bldg 1, San Jose, Calif
Date: Sunday May 17 2015
Time: 2-4pm
We’re looking for people with various skills including:
Our annual spring auction is our biggest single fundraiser of the year, and hence it’s very important to the club. It can get intense, so we’re looking to automate the bookkeeping and item/bidder/seller tracking. During this kickoff meeting, we’ll demo a prototype of a python-based auction manager that’s in the works. We’ll throw in a wrinkle into the demo to make things interesting, so bring your laptops/tablets!
Those who want to acquire new skills are also welcome. If you’re interested please join us at our inaugural meeting and/or join the new SJAA Coders Google group.
Hope to see you there!
