Date: October 28, 2009

Title: Funny You Should Ask About the Next Step in Your Astronomy Journey

Podcaster: Jeff Thibodeau

Organization: Oklahoma City Astronomy Club at: www.okcastroclub.com

Description: Benefits of astronomy clubs and a little encouragement to get involved.

Bio: Jeff Thibodeau has had a lifelong love for observing things in the night sky and has served as president of the Oklahoma City Astronomy Club for the past six years. During that time he has overseen a doubling in the club’s membership and been a key player in the building of the club’s first observatory in the Watonga, Oklahoma, area. In his spare time Jeff has organized numerous star party events to bring astronomy to the public. During quiet times he has contributed hundreds of observations on stellar luminosity to the American Association of Variable Star Observers. Jeff is known among his peers as someone who can find extremely dim and distant objects at the very limits of the telescope equipment he is using and his skill in finding and even describing what others deem ‘invisible galaxies’ has helped him gather numerous observing awards from the Astronomical League as well.

Today’s sponsor: This episode of “365 Days of Astronomy” is sponsored by John Given in honor of his wife, Nancy Cotton, and their upcoming 17th anniversary. Nancy bought John his first telescope more than a dozen years ago, and they now share the night sky with their two children, Sam and Ben. Happy Anniversary, Nancy, I love you.”

Now on to the podcast by Jeff Thibodeau, President of the Oklahoma City Astronomy Club, big fan of the NHL, friend and a great resource of the night sky.

Transcript:

Hello!

My name is Jeff Thibodeau. I am currently serving in my sixth year as president of the Oklahoma City Astronomy Club. Our group was formed in 1958 and we have on average about 120 active members.

If you have been listening to these pod casts regularly you’ve been able to hear a wide variety of speakers talk about everything in astronomy from cutting edge scientific break troughs to the simple joys of sitting in a lawn chair and gazing upward in wonder. At some point you may have wondered “Just how can I get more involved? How can I learn more?”

Funny you should ask.

If you live in the Oklahoma City area we would love for you to come to one of our monthly meetings and get to know us. We have people who can help get you started in the right direction. If you don’t live in our area you should find another astronomy club to get connected with. There are literally hundreds of them across the US and many more around the globe. Astronomy clubs offer a place for likeminded people to get together and share their ideas, compare different telescopes and equipment or just socialize under the stars.

There is no need to worry about not “being smart enough”. Most astronomy club members are average people just like you and me. Nor should you worry about fitting in. If you want to talk about stars, galaxies, planets, comets, and other celestial topics you will find people who are just as enthusiastic as you are and will be happy to make you acquaintance. One of the activities we have in our club is a monthly ‘star party’. We pack up all of our own telescopes and charts and red flash lights and warm clothes and coffee and snacks and meet at a place that is far from the city lights. Then we look at our favorite objects until we get tired and go home one by one.

These are great activities for new people to get involved with! Before you spend any money on a telescope you should definitely go to one of these star parties! Our people like people everywhere are natural born show offs. They can’t wait for you to look through their eye piece and say ‘Wow’. You will see many wonders in your first night, AND you will be able to talk to the people about what they like in their telescopes and what they don’t like. This is the ultimate test drive for you before you spend any money.

Many clubs have their own ‘Dark Sky Observing’ sites. This makes finding a safe dark place much easier than driving around lost in the country at night hoping for the best. Our club spent the last few years procuring and improving just such a site. We planned on saving our pennies to buy some land. But one wise person said: “We have a 501C3 status with the IRS which makes donations to our club tax deductable. Why don’t we just ask if someone will donate it?” We took out ads in all the small town newspapers within a ninety minute drive of home and told everyone who we were and what we were planning on doing. Within a week we had not one offer but three. We inspected all three sites and decided which one was best. We thanked the other two people who had offered us land and set about improving our new home. We wrote letters to various charitable foundations. We ran an internal fund raiser as well. Within a couple of years we had enough money to put up a nice general purpose building on our site. We did the work ourselves and saved tens of thousands of dollars in construction costs. And now we have a place to store our equipment, get out of the cold or heat, use the plumbing and even spend the night if we are too tired to go home.

Another great asset to being in an astronomy club is the monthly meeting itself. You meet up with friends both old and new and you usually get to hear a good quality talk about some aspects of astronomy. In our club we contact local professors and use our own people to speak on what they are doing. This gives a nice broad spectrum of topics and covers many interests. Our club offers training for novices to learn the constellations and how to find things in the sky. We train people in how to use their equipment better.

I don’t say these things just to brag on my own club which I am quite proud of, but to let you know that in your own community such clubs exist already. Most of the activities I have talked about exist in your local club already and while I believe that ours is the best I am sure that you will find a great place to express your interests in your own community as well. “How do I find one of these clubs in my area?” you ask.

Funny you should mention that.

Most astronomy clubs in the USA are members of a group called the Astronomical League. If you search for their website you will find they have a link listing all their member clubs. There is most likely one quite close to you now. Sky and Telescope magazine online also has a listing of astronomy clubs that you can look up.

In fact while you are surfing the web, look up our club’s website. Oklahoma City Astronomy Club. Any good search engine will find it or the other two sites pretty quickly. Spend some time just exploring all three sites. There is a wealth of information on each. If you have any questions you can always find my email address on our website or just remember President at www.okcastroclub.com.

Go ahead. Take the next step. You’ll be glad you did.

End of podcast:

365 Days of Astronomy
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The 365 Days of Astronomy Podcast is produced by the New Media Working Group of the International Year of Astronomy 2009. Audio post-production by Preston Gibson. Bandwidth donated by libsyn.com and wizzard media. Web design by Clockwork Active Media Systems. You may reproduce and distribute this audio for non-commercial purposes. Please consider supporting the podcast with a few dollars (or Euros!). Visit us on the web at 365DaysOfAstronomy.org or email us at info@365DaysOfAstronomy.org. Until tomorrow…goodbye.