Why isn’t everyone an astronomer?

[johninderby]

[niallk]

^^^ That's right, dobs rule! 🤣

(Sorry, wrong thread)

[mikemarotta]

On 27/12/2020 at 07:52, Tiny Clanger said:

In the 1960s my dad worked for J.R Gaunt & sons, one of many button makers in Brum ( https://www.oldcopper.org/makers/buttons_birmingham.php, ) they also made military badges and medals , they were I believe taken over in the 70's by the Birmingham Mint , around that time my dad went to work for Hoskins and Sewell another company founded in Victroria's reign , who made metal bed frames, specifically hospital ones when dad worked for them.

Good money Birmingham button makers, the Royal Mint, and the beginnings of modern coinage, 1775-1821 ; private enterprise and popular coinage by George A Selgin; 2011     
Ann Arbor, Mich: Univ. of Michigan Press.

Also, Jane Jacobs, The Economy of Cities. [Middlesex] : Penguin, [1972, 1969] Jacobs contrasts Birmingham with Manchester. Here in the States, Manchester would be Detroit: a town dependent on a single industry.  What inform me as the "Brummie metal bashers" was a complex and changing array of businesses, not a single line of work, as were spinning cotton into cloth or assembling automobiles.  

 

[mikemarotta]

On 27/12/2020 at 17:22, PXR-5 said:

One of my pet peeves is junky department store scopes.   People buy them and then can't see a thing.  And if they finally see the Moon, the darn mount is too shaky.  Go inside and watch TV

Nonsense. We could go around on this. I have a shaky 70 mm National Geographic that I use while my 10-inch RCT sits in the garage. It weight 65 lbs to my 68 kg.

https://necessaryfacts.blogspot.com/2019/12/in-support-of-entry-level-telescope.html

This past October I bought myself an Explore Scientific First Light 102 mm refractor. It was $239 retail and the best thing about it is that I can carry it through the back door and out into the yard.  The best telescope is the one that gets used.

Edited December 29, 2020 by mikemarotta
grammar

[Zermelo]

On 27/12/2020 at 20:34, Tiny Clanger said:

 "In the past, this (whatever) would occasionally be done in school as a practical demonstration, but for some time now the law has forbidden it as too dangerous "

I pre-date most of the health-and-safety changes*, but there was still a degree of variation among the staff as to their risk aversion. We had one who was known universally among the students as "the Queen of the safety screen".

* no protective clothing or glasses; setting fire to ammonium dichromate? of course;   dissolving metals in concentrated sulphuric acid? sure;   blow-pipe onto the charcoal block, metal oxides into your eyes? why not.

Edited December 30, 2020 by Zermelo

[DaveL59]

On 27/12/2020 at 21:24, Moonshed said:

That is precisely the sort of thing that gets the attention of the whole class, plus as a bonus it employs the use of magic!

funnily enough, the physics master at my school was a member of the magic circle and he taught us some magic as off-curricular studies 🙂 

[PXR-5]

2 hours ago, mikemarotta said:

Nonsense. We could go around on this. I have a shaky 70 mm National Geographic that I use while my 10-inch RCT sits in the garage. It weight 65 lbs to my 68 kg.

https://necessaryfacts.blogspot.com/2019/12/in-support-of-entry-level-telescope.html

This past October I bought myself an Explore Scientific First Light 102 mm refractor. It was $239 retail and the best thing about it is that I can carry it through the back door and out into the yard.  The best telescope is the one that gets used.

Well, remember you and I are already astronomers.

We have the patience and even desire to make something work. 

 

I enjoy picking up telescopes from garage sales that nobody really wants. 

I tune them up, make some improvements and donate them to my club.

 

They distribute them to schools and libraries in less fortunate areas :)