Specola Guestbook: Oct 21, 1910 – Guido Horn d’Arturo

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This entry is part 19 of 19 in the series Specola Guestbook

Since its founding in 1891, many people have passed through the doors of the Vatican Observatory.  A quick perusal of our guestbook reveals several Names, including Popes, nobel laureates, astronauts, actors, and saints.

Today's guestbook entry is from October 21, 1910, when Guido Horn made a visit.

Guido Horn d'Arturo (1879-1967). Source: University of Bologna Historic Archives.

Next to his name, Guido Horn d'Arturo (1879-1967) wrote, "R. osservatorio astronomico di Torino" (Royal astronomical observatory of Turin).

He was an astronomer who in 1921 would become the director of the Bologna observatory. Born in Trieste, he studied in Vienna and then worked at observatories in Trieste, Catania, Turin (where he was at the time of his visit to the Specola) and the Roman College, before ending up in Bologna.

During World War I (i.e. after his visit to the Specola), Guido Horn added d'Arturo to his name to Italianize it. He served in the Italian army, though his native Trieste was part of the Austro-Hungarian empire at that time.  At the start of World War II, he lost his post at Bologna because he was a Jew. He was reinstated in 1945.

Guido Horn was one of the first to attempt a segmented-mirror design for large telescopes. His early mirror composed of hexagonal segments had a diameter of 180 cm.

Guido Horn d'Arturo with his segmented mirror. (Source: Museo Ebraico di Bologna)

Coelum Astronomia Magazine

In 1921, he started the Pubblicazioni dell'Osservatorio Astronomico Universitario. He also founded the astronomy magazine Coelum in 1931.

 

The asteroid 3744 Horn-d'Arturo is named for him.

 

Astronomy in Art & Architecture: Observatory Park and the Cathedral, Denver

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Consider the picture below for your top ten list of “things that you just do not see every day”.  Note the houses, the baseball game in the park, and… the observatory.  How often do you see a baseball game being played next to an observatory, in a park in a residential neighborhood? You might see it every summer day if you lived in a certain neighborhood south of downtown Denver (Colorado, USA).  This park—called “Observatory Park”—is indeed in a residential neighborhood, and it is the home of Chamberlin Observatory of the University of Denver.  The small building in the picture above is Chamberlin’s student observatory.  The view below, of the same student observatory but from the opposite direction, shows the main building. There is not just a baseball diamond near the observatory; behind the main building is a playground.  The playground features a bit of astronomy-themed art, which is of course appropriate for Observatory Park.  A very stylized solar system, … Continue reading →

Across the Universe: Stellar Round Up

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This entry is part 90 of 186 in the series Across the Universe

This column first appeared in The Tablet in October 2008; we first ran it here in 2016 Black Mesa, Oklahoma sounds like the setting for a Hollywood Western. It looks like one, too. Every year at the Okie-Tex Star Party, three hundred amateur astronomers camp out for a week with their telescopes there, in hopes of dark dry skies. Some of their “amateur” instruments are larger in aperture than the telescopes of the Vatican Observatory in Castel Gandolfo. The miracle of computerized fabrication and the modern Dobsonian mount (a way of holding a telescope in place that replaces complex hardware with simple Teflon pads) has brought the cost of quality optics to the point where the price of a large telescope can be less than that of a small automobile. My GPS unit directed me as far as Boise City, two hours north of Amarillo, Texas; after that, I was following roads too small for most maps. I was there … Continue reading →

Skyward by David Levy: October 2019 – California and the Universe

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This entry is part 19 of 19 in the series Skyward by David Levy

California and the Universe Since early in the last century, astronomers dreamed of the clear sky over California as a place to unlock our imaginations and study the Universe. In 1917, the 100-inch Hooker telescope was opened to the poetry of Alfred Noyes, who wrote: We creep to power by inches. …Even to-night Our own old sixty has its work to do; And now our hundred-inch: I hardly dare To think what this new muzzle of ours may find. And just think what the new telescope did find; among many other things, it revealed that our Universe was double the size we thought it was. Despite the fact that I have visited Mount Wilson many times, my most recent visit in September gave me an insight I hadn’t experienced before. I was a guest of Scott Roberts, whose Explore Scientific telescope company had organized an observing party there. The place literally oozes history through every stone, piece of wood, and … Continue reading →

In the Sky This Week – October 15, 2019

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This entry is part 118 of 118 in the series In the Sky This Week

Saturn and Jupiter are excellent observing targets all week after sunset – Jupiter is getting lower towards the horizon each evening. I’m also noting that it’s getting darker earlier each evening. The Moon appears in the predawn sky this week, moving from west to east; the waning gibbous Moon appears high in the western sky before sunrise on Oct. 15 & 16th. On Oct. 17 and 18th, the waning gibbous Moon appears near the star Aldebaran in the southwestern predawn sky. The third-quarter Moon appears high in the southern predawn sky near the star Pollux on Oct. 21st. Mars appears low in the eastern sky just before sunrise. Orion was again impossible to miss high in the southern predawn sky. Betelgeuse Betelgeuse is generally the ninth-brightest star in the night sky and second-brightest in the constellation of Orion (after Rigel). It is a distinctly reddish, semiregular variable star whose apparent magnitude varies between +0.0 and +1.3, the widest range of any first-magnitude star. At near-infrared wavelengths, Betelgeuse is the brightest star in the night sky. It has the Bayer … Continue reading →

Joseph Antoine Ferdinand Plateau – Google Doodle Scientist

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There is a new “Google Doodle” for a scientist today—Joseph Antoine Ferdinand Plateau.  You have probably seen it.  Google states that his work “led to the birth of cinema”.  Well, guess what?  According to an old edition of the Catholic Encyclopedia, Plateau was “a sincere Christian, faithful to all the duties of a practical Catholic”. If you are interested in his work, the journal Physics in Perspective published an article on him in 2012: “The Life and Work of Joseph Plateau: Father of Film and Discoverer of Surface Tension”.  Click here for an excerpt.  Click here to get the entire article from Physics in Perspective.  The entire article is also freely available via EBSCO, through many public and academic libraries. Plateau was born in 1801 and died in 1883.  According to Physics in Perspective, “Plateau dedicated himself passionately to the study of … soap membranes until 1844, when he gradually became blind.”  Thus for much of his career Plateau could … Continue reading →

From The Backyard: Stars, Birds, Autumn Leaves, GK Chesterton, and The Little Flower.

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Do you enjoy the endless wonder of God’s handiwork that is your backyard? Whether your backyard is a back forty or forty feet of enclosed concrete, I assure you there is something worth discovering just outside your door. Some may dismiss this idealistic, romantic notion as merely the whimsical musings of an aloof theologian priest who tries way too hard to see God in all things. Others may want to believe that signs of God’s handiwork can be this close to them, but hesitate due to years of feeling estranged from the divine. And those who daily practice divine attentiveness might simply smile at my question and affirm, “Of course I live in wonder!”  I can see all three responses to the question of wonderment present in my life and ministry. When I’m at my best, I find a deep connection with God that allows me to see every moment as an encounter with the Lord. There are times, sadly, … Continue reading →

Endeavour Space Academy – 2019 Session #2: An Unexpected Lesson in Light Pollution

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I started off our last club meeting by showing my “In the Sky” post I’d written the day before – hey… why not!? Several of the students said that they had seen Ursa Major, and a couple said they could see the Mizar/Alcor double star! This week’s constellation was Cassiopeia; I showed the students where to find the constellation, and some deep-sky objects in the Cassiopeia, including the open cluster M103. I discussed the differences between open and globular star clusters, and showed a few examples of each. We discussed galaxy mergers, and I showed this animation of galaxy mergers seen from different perspectives: We then discussed how the Andromeda galaxy and the Milky Way will collide in several billion years; I showed this PBS video about the collision: During the video, one of the students asked my wife “What is that band of stars behind the narrator?” I stopped the video, and brought up a photo of the Milky Way … Continue reading →

Specola Guestbook: July 11, 1910 – Emily Dobbin

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This entry is part 18 of 19 in the series Specola Guestbook

Since its founding in 1891, many people have passed through the doors of the Vatican Observatory.  A quick perusal of our guestbook reveals several Names, including Popes, nobel laureates, astronauts, actors, and saints. Today’s guestbook entry is from July 11, 1910, when Emily Dobbin made a visit. Next to her name, Emily Elisabeth Dobbin (1875-1949) wrote, “Inst. Math & Surveying, M.A.H.S., St. Paul, Minn.” (Instructor of Mathematics and Surveying, Mechanic Arts High School, St. Paul MN) Dobbin was trained as an astronomer, receiving a masters’ degree from the University of Chicago in 1903. She worked at Yerkes Observatory, resulting in two single-authored publications (one on the orbit of the Jovian satellite Amalthea and another on Orion-type stars). However, her astronomical career never really progressed past that point. She taught mathematics, first at the University of Missouri, and then at a high school in St. Paul, Minnesota. Dobbin is particularly notable for her work in an entirely different field: that of … Continue reading →

Putting the Space Station Where You Want It

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Tonight I have a public program at my college’s observatory, which is located in a park in rural Indiana called South Harrison Park.  When putting together a schedule for the observatory, I try to find especially cool stuff around which to build programs.  Flyovers of the International Space Station (ISS) are always cool.  A night with a moon, planets, and an ISS flyover are great.  Thus, the night of October 12 seemed perfect for a program, because a quick look at the sky for that night using the Stellarium planetarium app shows the ISS passing through the evening sky, coming quite close to Saturn at 7:27 PM Eastern Time. But the above is the view Stellarium gives of the ISS from “Louisville, Kentucky”, latitude N 38° 15′ 15.26″, longitude W 85° 45′ 33.87″.  The ISS is not very high above Earth—roughly 250 miles.  That may seem like a lot, but it is not so much that a change of position … Continue reading →

ⓜ The day I almost met Buzz… Diary of 11 October, 2019

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This entry is part 46 of 46 in the series Diary

So, this week I was supposed to meet Buzz Aldrin. It didn’t happen, but how it almost happened is a story. And it reminds me of all the other famous (and almost famous) that I met (or almost met)… But first, our stats: As of today, we have 143 paid subscribers, an increase of 4 since last month. Every one of you is most welcome, and every one of you helps the cause! What’s more, there are (as of this writing) 9203 people who get notified of new postings, a jump of about 150 compared to last month. We continue to grow… still,  not nearly fast enough to keep us in business. We pay our writers (a pittance, but still it’s something) and the web site and its support does not come for free. Please tell more people about our site. And if you can, please subscribe at a rate of $10 a month (that’s about two visits to Dunkin Donuts … Continue reading →

Across the Universe: Asking the right questions

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This entry is part 42 of 186 in the series Across the Universe

This column ran in The Tablet in October, 2007; we first ran it here in 2015 My first scientific paper, more than thirty [forty!] years ago, was a review of the icy moons of Jupiter. Knowing only the mass and volume of the moon Europa and the evidence of its bright surface, I calculated that Europa’s density matched a mixture of rock and ice, with enough rock (90%) that its natural trace radioactivity would, over the age of the solar system, melt the ice. Europa, I asserted, should have a shiny thin ice crust, a moon-like rocky center, and a liquid ocean water between the two. I even speculated about creatures swimming in that ocean. Then the Voyager and Galileo spacecraft arrived and mapped that moon, showing the kinds of cracks expected for ice overlaying an ocean. And Europa deflected Jupiter’s magnetic field just like a salty, electrically conductive ocean might do. Now I’ve been invited to co-author the lead … Continue reading →