General Information
The Society is a not-for-profit organization, incorporated in 1959, for the purpose of public education in Astronomy and related sciences.
The Society holds public meetings the third Tuesday of each month at 7:30 pm at Fox Island County Park. Special general meetings might be held at other locations and are announced in our newsletter "The Eyepiece".
The Society conducts public observing sessions at its observatory every clear Saturday evening, from April through November, conducted by trained and experienced Society members. Public observing starts 1-hour after sunset and continues for two hours. The Society can also give special "star parties" for schools, scouts, or other groups.
The observatory is located in Fox Island County Park at 7324 Yohne Road southwest of Fort Wayne.
A monthly newsletter "The Eyepiece" is published by the Fort Wayne Astronomical Society to keep members informed of up-coming events, meetings, field trips and interesting facts on Astronomy.
The Society observatory was started in 1961 and completed and open to the public in 1963. It was located north of Fort Wayne, on DuPont Road. Creeping light pollution from street and security lights caused skies to become less than desirable and in 1978, it was moved to Fox Island County Park.
Observatory Building Closeup PanOgraphic Photo
The building, designed and built by Glenn Harnishfeger and other members of the Society, is made entirely of wood, and is designed to protect the observers from wind, and stray light that would interfere while observing faint objects. This observatory is unusual in design in that the dome and walls rotate together, rather than just the top as in other observatories. Rotation is controlled by the operator and is driven by a motor located under the floor.
The public is welcome to visit the observatory, located at Fox Island County Park every clear Saturday evening from April thru November. Public observing starts 1-hour after sunset and continues for two hours.
the Observatory Telescope
The telescope, also made by Glenn Harnishfeger and Marice Crow, at the Fox Island Observatory is operated exclusively by the Society. It is a Newtonian reflecting telescope that uses a twelve and one-half inch diameter concave mirror to collect the light from very distant objects. The mirror has its front surface silvered, unlike the mirrors you have at home which have their back side silvered. It collects 2,000 times more light than the naked eye, allowing us to see very faint objects.
The combination of the length of the telescope tube (or the focal length of the primary mirror, is another way to say the same thing) , and an eyepiece lens, will determine the power or magnification of the telescope. Since the length of the tube cannot be changed, the eyepiece lenses are interchanged to change the magnification. We generally use magnifications between 50 and 160 on Saturday nights, to keep the view through the telescope pleasing for everyone. The telescope is automatically driven by a motor to compensate for the rotation of the earth. Without the motor drive, all the objects we look at would drift across the field of view.
Objects within and beyond Our Solar System
Our Solar System contains all the objects under the influence of the gravity of our Sun. These include planets, moons, comets, meteors, and asteroids. All of these objects are in orbit about the Sun.
Of all the various objects we view through the telescope, our own Moon and the planets are always the most impressive to the first time or casual observer. They are the brightest and the most easily understood. On the Moon we can easily see the mountain ranges, hundreds of craters (ringed moun-tains), and the seas (plains). The best time to view the Moon is at First Quarter (half Moon), when we can see the long shadows cast by the sun shining on the mountains and craters.
All the planets can be seen through the observatory telescope, but two are rarely viewed. Elusive Mercury is too close to the sun and distant Pluto is too faint. Venus shows a bright white face; Mars shows dark markings at closest approach; Jupiter shows dark cloud belts and four bright moons; Saturn displays its beautiful ring system and several small moons; Uranus and Neptune are seen as small blue-green disks.
Double stars, sometimes showing a beautiful color contrast, can be viewed at any time of the year. Some are physically close together in space orbiting about each other, and others appear close only because of our line-of-sight.
Various nebulae, bright clouds of glowing gases, can be viewed during the summer and winter seasons. Some are birthplaces of stars, while others are remnants of old dying stars.
Galaxies beyond our Milky Way can also be viewed. The Great Galaxy in Andromeda is the closest galaxy to our Milky Way. It is visible during the fall, and can be glimpsed on a clear moonless night with the naked eye. The light we see from these remote galaxies has been traveling through space for millions of years.
