Welcome to this issue of DSO. As most members know this year is the 200th anniversary of the birth of Webb and in order to mark the occasion the Society’s AGM has been moved to December to get as close to the actual date as possible. The main theme of the meeting will, of course, be Webb himself. Next year marks the 40th anniversary of the foundation of the Society started in 1967 by Jim Muirden and John Larard as a breakaway group from what became The Astronomer magazine. Hopefully next year we will have a meeting to celebrate. The tentative time for this will be early June 2007.
The Society itself is run by a very small group of people most of whom have been doing the job for a long time and we would invite anyone with an interest in the Society’s affairs to consider standing for the committee. In terms of DSO we have enough in the locker for the next issue but we are then running low, so if you have any material that you would like to see in the magazine then please send it in otherwise you may get Tenerife 2 – The Return of the Galaxies after the trip that Stewart and I will be taking next March!
One thing we are looking at to grow the membership is somebody in the north of the UK who would be willing to take some Webb sales items along to the northern meetings. The autumn star party season was a partial success. The Equinox Star Party had four clearish nights, although I missed 50%. The Friday night was pretty good despite the running water! I always envy Ron Morales when he says he does not observe if the humidity is about 35%. Here it is usually closer to 80%. I did have one of my best views of Jones1 this time though with the full circle of the planetary being visible. We did spend a lot of time on globular clusters though.
I was also invited to give a talk at Kelling this time whose title was originally “Deep Sky Observing from the UK, why bother?” I did manage to make a better stab at a title later. For the second major star party at Kielder the forecast did not look good and events conspired so that I missed it. Interestingly, as I look out the window, the skies are crystal clear and the Moon is up!!
Other meeting dates for 2007 include the BAA Deep Sky Section meeting on the 3rd of March.
At this time it is unlikely that the Society will be at Astrofest 2007. our takings have been dropping over the last few years and the costs have been going up so it is difficult to cover our expenses. I suspect that some of us will be wandering around the show like lost souls anyway.
Society Publications
Hopefully at the AGM the long awaited Vol II of Mike Ropelwski’s Visual Atlas of Double Stars will be out and Stewart and I are working on the Bennett Catalogue for next year. We also hope to publish Stewart’s Guide to the NGC/IC Planetaries.
News Notes
For interest I have discovered that books are like busses. There are two books on the Herschel list due out next year. One by James Mullaney from Springer and one from Steve O’Meara from Cambridge. Mind you CUP still have not yet got his book on the Hidden Gems out yet. I had been hoping for a bonanza of deep sky books for my Christmas lists but for some strange reason they have all been put back to February.
Errata
I must apologise to Wolfgang for the late publication of his review. It should have been in the one before last but due to a mix-up another review was published twice.
I must also apologise to Rob Carver over his Webb article. I mistakenly changed the name of Webb’s Oxford College and although I spotted the mistake, the change was not made.
Editor: Owen Brazell