November 2021 President’s message
by Steve Siok
We, as Skyscrapers, need to share our interest, experiences and knowledge of Astronomy with everyone we meet. This is the best way we can grow our society, to bring in more people of all levels of understanding. I had a visitor today who wanted me to help him understand his telescope, because he was having trouble using it. But he did not bring the scope with him. And so we talked. “Tell me about your telescope”. He explained it was on a tripod. OK. “How do you observe”. I look in the side. So was that a reflector or a refractor with a 90 degree prism. He was not sure but he said he wanted to get “one of those barrel telescopes” in the future. The problem he reported was that when he “tightened the screws” the scope shifted and the moon was no longer visible.
So to all of you, put yourselves in the position of helping the most fundamental novice and determine how you can help the person use their scope and how you can bring them into the more inclusive experiences of finding objects and becoming an amateur astronomer. My experience with this person was to learn they were very interested in learning about the sky but could not get beyond the fundamentals of scope use, let alone finding objects. This is a very important purpose we must serve. So all of you join us at events and help us, as a society, to assist the uninitiated and grow their passion for Astronomy.
