[pasmembers] Re: Clyde Tombaugh

  • From: Robert Ewing <rrewing9@xxxxxxxxx>
  • To: pasmembers@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Sat, 9 May 2015 11:10:32 -0700

In June 1987 I attended the Texas Star Party at Ft. Davis.......great
skies...they had a special program one night at McDonald Observatory where
Clyde Tombaugh spoke and signed certificates for those of us who donated to
his educational fund. Nice fellow. Very short stature!! Thought he was
quite elderly at that time! :-) ha. He recalled his younger days at
Lowell Observatory.
Glad I got to meet him.

Bob E
On May 9, 2015 10:06 AM, "Terri" <starstuff@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Very interesting, Alex. I didn't know he was around in 1997. Thank you
for sharing.

Sent from my TARDIS via my Samsung Galaxy S5 Android Phone complete with
typos for your enjoyment.
On May 8, 2015 4:14 AM, "Alex Vrenios" <axv@xxxxxxx> wrote:

From an encyclopedia article about Clyde Tombaugh:

"Upon his retirement in 1973, Tombaugh maintained his links to New Mexico
State University, often attending lunches and colloquia in the astronomy
department that he helped to found. He also remained active in the local
astronomical society and continued to observe with his homemade telescopes.
Indeed, asked by the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., to
relinquish his 9-in reflector to its historical collections, Tombaugh
refused, explaining to Smithsonian magazine, "I'm not through using it
yet!" He died in 1997 at his home in Las Cruces, New Mexico.”



From an Astronomy Magazine article about Clyde Tombaugh’s 16” telescope:

"The telescope does have a mechanism to compensate for Earth’s rotation,
but it is in no way a “go-to” scope. It has no computer or electronics
attached to it, and no electrical motor. Aiming the telescope at
a celestial object is a manual operation. The operator sights through a
finder scope, and then centers the object in the main eyepiece.

"The telescope’s drive motion comes from gravity. A weight-driven,
fly-ball governor assembly attached to the right ascension axis drives the
telescope across the sky. Once the weight hits the ground, the
operator must wind it back up to continue observing.”


Alex


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