419th Meeting 6th October 2006

The 419th Meeting of the Altrincham and District Astronomical Society, held at Timperley Village Scout hut on Friday 6th October 2006 at 8pm
Those present were:
Paul Clark, Kevin Thurstan, Richard Bullock
Mark Crossley, Philip Masding, Paul Brierly,
Geoffrey Walton, Graham Sinagola, Nick Dixon,
Ged Birbeck, John Tipping, Roger Livermore,
Peter Baugh, Colin Bowler, Geoff Flood,
Mike Cook, Norman Thurstan, Nick Odam,
Jordan Odam, Stephen McHugh, Ken Simons.
(Total 21)
The Chairman welcomed us all to the meeting and announced that this month Mike Cook and himself would be doing a presentation on what they did on their recent trip to Sutherland in South Africa.
Mike began by telling us of his latest equipment changes and orders, he then began the first part of the evenings talk.
Their first morning in South Africa saw a blood red sunrise as the sun rose through the distant cloud on the horizon.
We were told that the man they were staying with Dave, got them into all the observatories on the SALT site and Mike went on to show us some pictures of and describe some of the ones they visited, including a tour of the SALT facility. He explained they were a 350 mile drive from Cape Town and that the observatories all do their own maintenance and re-aluminising in house. We were also given a description of the area and local town.
Mike Informed us that they were given the keys to a large shed with a complete roll off roof containing a 16” LX 200 and a C14.
He also told us to get the best view of the Milky Way was to lay down in the dirt road on the carpet they took from the boot of the hire car.
We then stopped for a tea break.
Paul restarted by describing how at the onset of darkness the Milky Way was right overhead, all the northern constellations were upside down and moved the wrong way across the sky because Sutherland was 32 degrees south of the equator.
He explained that the Milky Way was so bright you could see your shadow by it but that even though the sky was not dark there was no light pollution. We were then shown various pictures of parts of and the whole of the Milky Way in colour and monochrome and given vivid descriptions.
There was then time for some questions on what we had seen and heard of the trip.
Next we covered the societies business
The secretary said that the planned October trip to Delamere was not happening and that he was also waiting for news of a possible donation from the Altrincham Festival Committee.
Paul mentioned that coming up were the Keilder Star party and Peak star party III.
He told us that next month we would have a talk by Peter Schick and brought the meeting to a close.

418th Meeting and 41st AGM 1st September 2006

The 418th Meeting and 41st AGM of the Altrincham and District Astronomical Society, held at Timperley Village Scout hut on Friday 1st September 2006 at 8pm
Those present were:
Paul Clark, Kevin Thurstan, Richard Bullock
Mark Crossley, Tony Aremia, Philip Masding,
Don Utton, Norman Thurstan, Colin Eaves,
Geoffrey Walton, John Tipping, Roger Livermore,
Paul Brierly, Colin Bowler, Geoff Flood,
Chris Suddick, Peter Baugh, Sarabani Datta,
Richard Sargent.
The chairman welcomed everybody to the 41st AGM and announced that we would conduct the usual AGM business after the break, but first we had a talk from Richard Sargent from Chester AS.
Richard told us that the talk was on The Astronomical observations of Henry Prescott, Deputy Registrar of the Diocese of Chester, who was born 9th June 1649 and died 9th June 1719 aged 70.
A few years ago Richard attended a local history talk and found out that they knew of the era because of the diaries of a man called Henry Prescott. Interested he went to the library and found a 3 volume copy of the diaries.
Henry was not an astronomer but did make quite a few astronomical entries in his diaries.
The originals are loose pages and many are missing ,however from 1704 onwards they are just about complete.
Henry Prescott was a lawyer by trade but he was also an antiquarian and a collector of antiquities including a large roman altar stone.
He was appointed Deputy Registrar of the Diocese of Chester in 1686, his boss was Walter Pope who was also professor of astronomy at Oxford university, appointed by his brother in law John Wilkins scientist and co founder of the Royal Society.
His first astronomical entry was the 26th January 1697. Indisposed after an evening with a friend where they consumed 17 pints of claret ,he spent most of the day abed. That evening after a stroll he was at Mr Robert Davies’s house and saw the moon through a telescope (the moon was only one day past full). Telescopes then were poor and it was probably a poor quality single lens refractor so they may not have seen much of interest..
His other astronomical entries included on 25th February 1706 an aurora and on 18th May 1710 he noted a bright meteor. In 1711 Henry also took on the post of registrar of the St Asaph diocese.
His next entry was the total solar eclipse of 22nd April 1715 from the falcon coffee house which still stands as a public house.
He next noted aurora on the 6th and 31st of March 1716, a halo around the moon on the 13th March 1717, aurora again on 30th March 1717 and 25th November 1718.
On 19th March 1719 he reported a fire ball that he didn’t see himself as he was indoors at the time, but this was reported to him. The same phenomena was noted by Edmund Halley.
Isaac Newton was put in charge of re-coinage and offered a job to Edmund Halley in the Chester mint so did Halley know of Henry Prescott?.
In Henry’s diary on January 10th 1697 Henry reported spending the evening with Mr Davies and Mr Halley. Halley’s own letter of 26th October 1696 mentions a Mr Prescott and his alter stone as well as other items.
The alter stone still exists and is on display at the Grosvenor museum in Chester.
We then heard of Edmund Halley’s predictions and observations of the total lunar eclipse of 31st October 1696 and partial lunar eclipse of the 19th October 1697.
We then broke for tea.
In the business section of the meeting Paul Clark stated that next months talk would be on the South African trip he and Mike Cook had just taken. He also recommended the Sky and Telescope pocket sky Atlas.
Over the summer the society surrendered its lease on the observatory site. Many thanks to Ged for sorting out the contractor and to Don, Chris and others for their trips to the tip with the excess rubbish. We now have the final paper work and the surrender of the lease is complete.
The treasurer reported a £384 surplus over the year and at the year end in June the society had £1843, the surplus was due mainly to a tax refund on subs backdated several years and the sale of the binocular parallel mount.
Since then the demolition and clearance of the old site at the cost of £1200, a cost of £200 for surrender of the lease, £430 for disconnection of the electric and the fact that we are owed £278 from powergen for overpayment of the electricity bill will leave the club with approximately £250.
There was then a discussion on incomings and outgoings including subs , cost of scout hut, Delamere and the country fair.
We were reminded that the Timperley fair is tomorrow and help was needed.
The meeting then came to the election of committee members. Kevin Thurstan was re-elected as secretary, Richard Bullock was elected as the treasurer and Paul Clark was re-elected as chairman.
The society thanked Mark Crossley for his work as treasurer over the past few years.
We then discussed new ideas for future meetings. It was also noted that the secretary would take over responsibility for the society’s equipment list and that what was left of the 14 inch scope and its mount would be going to Moorley Green AS for storage.
The next meeting will take place on Friday 6th October 2006 and we will still meet every Friday for a chat, tea and coffee at the scout hut.
The meeting was then brought to a close.