This event has passed. It took place on Tuesday, December 1, 2020.
Monthly Meeting
Public
The Great Telescope of Birr Castle: How a 19th-Century Irish Family Changed Astronomy
Presenter: Bill Higgins
Location: Streamed online.
For over 70 years, the largest telescope in the world was to be found in rural Ireland. Years of effort culminated in a moment in 1845 when William Parsons, third Earl of Rosse, gazed into the eyepiece of his 72-inch-diameter Leviathan and glimpsed the spiral arms of distant galaxies. The remarkable scientists, inventors, and artists of the Parsons clan may seem the stuff of steampunk, but Bill Higgins — having made a pilgrimage to Birr Castle — will assure you that they were quite real.
William S. Higgins, a volunteer speaker in NASA’s Solar System Ambassador program, speaks and writes about spaceflight, astronomy, and other topics in science and technology. He works as a radiation safety physicist at Fermilab, where he is involved in the transport of high-energy particle beams. He is proud to have been a member of the NAA for over 30 years.
This event is open to the public and free of charge.