A wonderful day with the BAA Historic Section

[Alan White]

Saturday 18th May, I attended my second BAA meeting.
Held in central Ipswich, Suffolk, a super venue in itself.

The day was co-hosted by BAA and Orwell Astronomical Society, more about them later.

The day made me nervous as days like this do, meeting new people and talks on something that interests me, but I have a limited knowledge of, but as always I need not have worried as everyone was most friendly and welcoming.

The subjects covered

10:10 – 10:40   Paul Whiting, “The Aurora, Past and Present”

10:40 – 11:40    Jack Martin, “The Bicentenary of William Huggins”

13:20 – 14:20    Andy Gibbs, “One hundred and fifty years of astronomy at Orwell Park”

14:20 – 15:20    Bill Barton, “Basil Brown’s Astronomical Achievements”

15:50 – 16:50    Dr. George Seabroke, “A girl’s death, Rugby, rugby and astronomy: dating a Dollond telescope.”

All the talks were super and held my interest, I do have to declare that I know Jack Martin through my club CPAC and had heard some of his talk previously. 
But the big reason for my trip was the talk on Basil Brown and his Astronomy.

I first became aware of Basil from his part in the finding of the Sutton Hoo ship and treasures, and by watching the Netflix film ‘The Dig’ and in watching this his Astronomical side was partly revealed, so I looked into him further.

The talk was marvellous and led to me seeing a copy of Basils book from the 1930’s but a 1960’s reprint, they are quite limited in numbers around.
I was fortunate in the lunch break to walk about central Ipswich with Bill, the speaker and discus Basil and Ipswich history.

My focus on one talk is not implying the others were not of interest, quite the opposite.

The meeting ended at 5 but with a later trip to the OAS observatory site, a stunning instrument of the Victorian era, in a dedicated tower observatory, now part of a private school.

The evening was a thorough pleasure and we got to not only look at it all, but to look through it at The Moon and double stars, sadly this time of year restricted darkness and of course a clear sky.

To end this here are some dreadful phone pictures.

And one last thing, my BAA membership was worth it for just this day alone.

 

 

 

 

 

I must add that during the evening, the OAS were superb hosts and made everyone feel very much part of the family, thank you.

https://oasi.org.uk/ 

The one thing that tickled my sense of humour was when Dr George Seabrooke was sat at the scope observing, how often do professional Astronomers observe through a telescope?

And a better image from the OAS website

 

Edited May 19 by Alan White

[RobertI]

Superb Alan, what an interesting and varied day. I’ll keep an eye out for the next one as it’s just up the road from me. What did you think of the views through the venerable refractor? 

[tomato]

Love the rack and pinion dome rotator, I have one just like it!

[Alan White]

6 hours ago, RobertI said:

Superb Alan, what an interesting and varied day. I’ll keep an eye out for the next one as it’s just up the road from me. What did you think of the views through the venerable refractor? 

It was very good for its age and type, 250 mm but in old money and I think about f15, doublet.
But I felt a modern scope of smaller size may outperform it.

I have looked through an 8” modern high spec scope and that although smaller was optically better, but the Tomline had something special and that was its age, mounting and location.

Well worth a trip sometime.

[Alan White]

3 hours ago, tomato said:

Love the rack and pinion dome rotator, I have one just like it!

It was a beast of a dome, but that rack and pinion worked a treat.