[sac-board] Re: Wally Brown

Gene,

The attachments were stripped by the list, Please forward to me off list,

Thanks

Clear Skies
Rick Tejera
President, Editor SACnews
Saguaro Astronomy Club
Phoenix, Arizona
www.saguaroastro.org
saguaroastro@xxxxxxx 

-----Original Message-----
From: sac-board-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:sac-board-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx]
On Behalf Of gene lucas
Sent: Monday, June 18, 2007 19:48
To: sac-board@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [sac-board] Re: Wally Brown

Rick (and others),
Attached is a scan of the obituary for Wally Brown (inserted into a Word
doc) which appeared in the Sunday, June 10, 2007 Arizona Republic. Below are
some short notes on Wally's important contributions to SAC in its early
years (also attached as a Word document).
In Memoriam -- Wally Brown
Notes by Gene Lucas (17250)

Wally J. Brown, Jr. moved to the Valley after working as a successful copy
writer and creative director for a major advertising firm in New York City.
Thereafter he ran his own free-lance advertising business here in Phoenix.
He was a talented artist as well as a clever advertising man and effective
speaker, and used those skills to help the club. He joined SAC in its early
years (about 1980) and enthusiastically promoted observing skills for
beginners (which was his own experience level at that time). He observed
mainly with a Celestron C-8, and developed a number of clever add-ons to aid
in observing, including a strap-on eyepiece and accessories case that
attached to the Celestron tripod, and an electric dew eliminator (several
years before the latter item became commercially available).

Wally organized and led the SAC Deep Sky Group meetings for a number of
years, encouraging the practice of members collecting and sharing their
observations. Beginning in 1981, Wally organized the first Messier Marathons
for the club (initially at the club's observing site at Fessler's Ranch,
north of town, and east of what is now the community of Anthem). He wrote
and published an outstanding booklet on observing the Messier objects,
illustrated with his own artwork and finder charts. He also wrote a number
of articles in the Newsletter on the Messier objects, as well as brochures
introducing the Club to the public. He also conducted private classes for
beginners at the Wilson Camera shop (with sales director Jack Johnston) in
Phoenix. From the class materials came an outstanding privately-published
booklet in 1984, titled "Astro Class Classics". The booklet included lots of
Wally's illustrations, with many sections devoted to taking the "mystery"
out of the ways of the sky, including finder charts for all the Messier
objects, notes on when the M objects were available in the sky, interesting
sky fields, a list of 100 color-contrasting double stars and how to observe
them, a list of three dozen select non-Messier NGC objects (with finder
sketches), and so forth. (The booklet was offered to several publishers, but
was never reprinted.) Later, Wally and Bob Buckner sponsored a 1,000-object
Observing Award program (with ads in Sky & Telescope). In addition to SAC,
Wally was the founder of the Arizona Darts League, and was a competitive
darts player locally.

 From the SAC Deep Sky Group April 1981 Messier Marathon booklet, here is a
short poem authored by Wally:

"Discount the lesson
so many learn
from pondering the celestial sea;
The one where countless
wonders seen
seed a sense of insignificant me.
I assure you,
the insignificant
would sit a lesser seat than we.
Indeed,
wondrous significance
attends the root ability."

Wally Brown, April 1981

Wally passed away on May 27, 2007, aged 75.


Rick Tejera wrote:

>All,
>Although I did not know Wally, I do know from conversations that he was 
>an active club member a while back. As is my custom, I'd like to run an 
>In Memoriam in the upcoming issue. Does anyone have any Photo's of 
>Wally, preferably with his telescope? Also if anyone would care to 
>write a few words about him, It would help me out tremendously.
>
>TIA
>
>Clear Skies
>
>Rick Tejera
>
>President, Editor SACnews
>
>Saguaro Astronomy Club
>
>Phoenix, Arizona
>
>www.saguaroastro.org <http://www.saguaroastro.org/>
>
>saguaroastro@xxxxxxx
>
>
>
>
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>
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>


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-- File: WALLY BROWN.doc


-- Binary/unsupported file stripped by Ecartis --
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-- File: Wally Brown - In Memoriam.doc

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