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The Age of Wonder: How the Romantic Generation Discovered the Beauty and Terror of Science
A book review by Dick Luecke British author Richard Holmes won laurels for his biographies of the Romantic poets. In Age of Wonder he extends his talents to Europe’s second great epoch of scientific discovery—a period roughly from the late 1760s through the 1820s. Holmes describes this fruitful era of science through the lives of [...]
The Celestial Observer – May, 2013
From the President Thanks to everyone who attended our April Business Meeting and to those who helped with the voting for our Young Astronomer’s Program. Soon some very deserving aspiring astronomers will be using their very own telescopes and binoculars to participate in the hobby that we all love and enjoy. Each winner will also [...]
How to Teach an Old DOB New Tricks
EconoDobs Asian Dobs, aka ”EconoDobs” include Synta (Orion, Skywatcherm Buschnell, from China and GSO (Zhumell, Apetura, AstroTech, Lightbridge, DBA and X-Class, from Taiwan How they do out of the box: Usually pretty good optics but hit or miss Low price and good value, bang for the buck Included eyepieces, crayford focusers and finder scopes are OK but not [...]
Observation Report: March 22, 2013, @ North Andover Soccer Fields
My Daughter and I went down to the North Andover soccer fields early this evening to observe PanSTARRS. We did see the comet although we had to deal with some thin bands of passing clouds near the horizon. We also observed the Orion nebula, the double cluster, Jupiter, the Pleiades and the moon. Our tools [...]
Observation Report, March 17, 2013
I went to IRWS this evening, mainly to try to see the comet, but also to participate in some public outreach because I can rarely make it to our star parties during the week. There was a presentation there last night, but the observing component was bumped to tonight because of cloudy weather. About 7 [...]
Collimation made simple
by Donald E. Pensack Collimation is the alignment of the optical parts of a telescope. Though lining up the secondary under the focuser is essential for uniform illumination of the field of view, there are only two critical alignments in Newtonian collimation: the Focuser Axis (aligned by adjusting the secondary mirror), and the Primary Axis [...]
The 9th Annual Young Astronomer Program (YAP)
WHO WON IN 2013? The winners of the 2013 YAP essay contest will be announced on April 17th via mail and email. Thank you for your patience while the board decides on the winning essays! What is it? The Young Astronomer Program is an essay contest for students in grades 4 through 8. Students interested [...]
Getting Started with Astronomy
By Kandy Rathinasamy I got started with astronomy about a year ago, so I’m a relative newbie. Here are some tips that I hope will help you get started. You don’t need a telescope You don’t need a telescope to get started. There’s a lot to see with the naked eye. Learn about the constellations [...]
Venus: Thermal Imaging
by John Boudreau. I was essentially clouded out of the Venus transit back on June 5th, only getting about 5 minutes of visual with a pair of filtered binoculars only minutes before sunset. However in the weeks leading up to that event, I was observing and imaging Venus regularly as it was becoming an ever thinning [...]
Shooting for the Moon
As part of a school project on astronomy a local student joined NSAAC and learned the fundamentals of astrophotography, and trained his scope on the moon. We think he will get an A.
The Eyepiece is half the Telescope
The eyepiece takes the image produced by the objective and magnifies it and projects it at infinity into your eye.
Star trails over Veasey Memorial park
This time-lapse image was captured in the parking lot one pleasant summer evening. The stars appear to move around a central point, when it is actually the earth that is moving.
The Bridal Veil Nebula
The Veil Nebula in Cygnus is my favorite summertime deep sky object. I first observed it with an 8scope many years ago. It is most likely a supernova remnant of a star that exploded 30 to 40 thousand years ago, although remains of the progenitor have never been identified. The Veil consists of three sections spanning about 2.6 degrees.
About the club
The NSAAC is an association of amateur astronomers who meet and observe from a local site on the North Shore of Massachusetts. Our members share in the beauty of the night sky and the belief that observing should be enjoyable.
YAP 2012 Winners
Latest blog posts
Andover’s YAP winner gets his binoculars and observing training
Oscar B. from the 4th grade class at Sanborn Elementary was one of the winners from the YAP program. I took the opportunity to deliver them in person as well as provide a small training session for Oscar, his dad, and Oscar’s friend Andrew. After a quick less on how to adjust binoculars an dread [...]
Friday, May 3, 2013
NSAAC Business Meeting Minutes President Stone called the March Business Meeting of the NSAAC to order at 8:14 PM. There were 7 members present plus 4 Board members. There was a quorum. Meeting was official. Secretary: Minutes of the April meeting were approved by acclamation. Treasurer: Treasurer’s books will not be closed until May. Membership: Kevin Ackert [...]