Part 4. Sacramento, 1958 to 1967: the street telescopes and leaving the monastery

The move came in 1958. He had been a monk in San Francisco for 14 years, and his word for it was that he was “shifted” to Sacramento. The Society’s group there had bought 7 acres in the nearby town of Carmichael, and the monks were building a center on it: a chapel, an auditorium, living quarters, roads, fences and gardens. The temple was dedicated in November 1964. Its minister a year on, the Sacramento Union said, was Swami Shraddhananda.55.Crater Lake interview, transcript; Mayer 1980, p. 24; Vedanta Society of Sacramento; Sacramento Union 1964-66, p. 24, p. 17.his own accountCrater Lake interview, transcript: F. Owen Hoffman’s own transcript of the same 31 July 2004 interview, posted before the edit.his own accountMayer 1980: Ben Mayer, “Astronomy on the Sidewalk” (interview with John Dobson), Astronomy, April 1980, pp. 24-28.a later writerVedanta Society of Sacramento: Vedanta Society of Sacramento, “Our Story” and “Resident Swamis” (web pages).record from the timeSacramento Union 1964-66: Sacramento Daily Union items on the Vedanta Society’s Carmichael center, November 1964 to April 1966 (California Digital Newspaper Collection).

Before anything was planted, test holes were drilled and filled with water, and the water took about a week to drain away. So the planting areas were dug out. Crushed granite sand, redwood sawdust and rice hulls came in by the ton and lay in long piles until the monks mixed them, with some of their own soil, in a rented concrete mixer and spread the mix by the acre.66.Memoir 3.his own accountMemoir 3: John Dobson, “Memoir 3”, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).

The ground they dug out was mostly hardpan, and the big hired scrapers could not cut through it, so he went in front of them with a spading fork. Once, when he drove his foot down, he missed the fork and broke the cartilage in his right knee. He was on crutches after that, though he could still outwalk Swami Shraddhananda. The work went on for months, and a little girl who lived next door wanted to know when they would be done: “When ya gonna finish, miwion thirty?”77.Memoir 3.his own accountMemoir 3: John Dobson, “Memoir 3”, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).

The country around Sacramento is flat, and the long piles of sand and rice hulls were the only hills the neighborhood children had. They played tag on them, jumping off the sand into the hulls and going in over their heads. Then one night, he wrote, a monk who was mixing soil ran the loader into a pile where a small boy was playing, and the boy barely got out of the way. After that there was no more work at night, and the children were not allowed on the grounds.88.Memoir 3.his own accountMemoir 3: John Dobson, “Memoir 3”, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).

The monks had one night a week to rest, with no class, and the children next door knew which night it was. They came asking, formally, to play tag on the piles. They found one of the monks, he went and got Dobson, and the two men said yes.99.Memoir 3.his own accountMemoir 3: John Dobson, “Memoir 3”, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).

So two monks and the children were out in the back by moonlight, running and yelling and going headfirst into the rice hulls, when a third monk walked out with a dim flashlight and caught them. As Dobson wrote it, the two of them were in deep trouble, and the other one left for Southern California. He himself was not asked to leave until some time later.1010.Memoir 3.his own accountMemoir 3: John Dobson, “Memoir 3”, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).

Only a fence separated the monastery grounds from a swim club on the south side. One day, working on the south wall, he looked down at the pools and saw two 10-year-olds going back and forth in a stroke he had never seen. It was butterfly. He was 45, and he learned it from them. By his own account he could swim a mile of it before he left Sacramento, though one of the two, older by then, said, “No one swims a mile butterfly.”1111.Memoir 3.his own accountMemoir 3: John Dobson, “Memoir 3”, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).

He had no money at all in the monastery, and the telescopes had to be made “on a shoestring”. His first telescope, by his own account, was a 12-inch with a mirror ground from porthole glass, made in San Francisco. The press biography written for a film about him says the first one he made in Sacramento was a 5-inch, with a mirror cut from the bottom of a gallon jug.1212.Mayer 1980, p. 25; Telescope Making 1983, p. 43; Crater Lake interview, edited; Film press biography.his own accountMayer 1980: Ben Mayer, “Astronomy on the Sidewalk” (interview with John Dobson), Astronomy, April 1980, pp. 24-28.his own accountTelescope Making 1983: “Dobson on Dobsonians”, his Riverside talk of May 1983, Telescope Making no. 20, pp. 43ff.his own accountCrater Lake interview, edited: F. Owen Hoffman, interview with John Dobson, 31 July 2004, Crater Lake Institute oral history, edited by Stephen R. Mark (December 2005).a later writerFilm press biography: Press biography for the film A Sidewalk Astronomer (2005), telescopepictures.com.

Don Moser wrote that in Sacramento he ground jug bottoms in a pail of water, to muffle the sound. The abrasive there, by Dobson’s own account, was the granite sand that had been bought for the garden, sorted through screens he made, and he made his own polishing rouge and did his own silvering. Levy put the jugs and the sand in San Francisco.1313.Moser 1989, pp. 102-110; PATS talk 2008, at 00:22:56, 00:23:02; Levy 1995.a later writerMoser 1989: Don Moser, “John Dobson, the celestial Pied Piper”, Smithsonian, April 1989, pp. 102-110.his own accountPATS talk 2008: John Dobson, “Einstein’s Geometry”, talk at the Pacific Astronomy and Telescope Show, 14 September 2008 (recording).a later writerLevy 1995: David H. Levy, “Walden of the Sky”, Sky & Telescope, September 1995, p. 84.

On his first mirror he had tried a Foucault tester. In Sacramento he had no tester of any kind, so he tested his mirrors on the stars, out of focus, and corrected them by polishing some more.1414.Mayer 1980, p. 25-26, p. 25.his own accountMayer 1980: Ben Mayer, “Astronomy on the Sidewalk” (interview with John Dobson), Astronomy, April 1980, pp. 24-28.

The tubes were the cardboard cores of hose reels, 22 inches long and 12 inches across inside, and he went to the supplier himself to get them. The wood, his club’s biography says, was scrap, some of it cutouts from schoolhouse doors. The diagonal was held by roof shingles that storms had blown off, already black from lying in the sun. The tube sat in a rocker, and the telescope went through the neighborhood on wheels, discarded wagon wheels, the press biography says.1515.Telescope Making 1983, p. 44, p. 43; Club biography; Herald and News 2004; Sky at Night 2006; Film press biography.his own accountTelescope Making 1983: “Dobson on Dobsonians”, his Riverside talk of May 1983, Telescope Making no. 20, pp. 43ff.a later writerClub biography: “John Dobson: A Brief Biography”, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).a later writerHerald and News 2004: Lee Juillerat, “Pied Piper of Astronomy”, Herald and News (Klamath Falls), July 2004.his own accountSky at Night 2006: Interview with John Dobson, BBC Sky at Night Magazine, December 2006.a later writerFilm press biography: Press biography for the film A Sidewalk Astronomer (2005), telescopepictures.com.

Stellatrope had a tube of four of those cores, end to end, and he was still using it in 1983. It had a companion called Heliotrope, which he had to sell to pay for diagonal-mirror glass. The first 18-inch mirror went into the telescope later called The Little One, and it waited a long time for its coating. Aluminizing cost money, and by his account he sold Green Stamps and Blue Chip Stamps for several years before he could pay for it.1616.Telescope Making 1983, p. 45, p. 43; Riverside talk, web text; Levy 1995.his own accountTelescope Making 1983: “Dobson on Dobsonians”, his Riverside talk of May 1983, Telescope Making no. 20, pp. 43ff.his own accountRiverside talk, web text: “Dobson on Dobsonians”, transcript of his 1983 Riverside talk, sidewalkastronomers.us.a later writerLevy 1995: David H. Levy, “Walden of the Sky”, Sky & Telescope, September 1995, p. 84.

While he was in Sacramento someone also bought him a ship’s window 24.5 inches across, off a Navy vessel. The 24-inch telescope he later took around the national parks was made from a ship’s window of the same size. Whether it was the same piece of glass is not known.1717.PATS talk 2008, at 00:16:28, 00:16:59, 00:18:12.his own accountPATS talk 2008: John Dobson, “Einstein’s Geometry”, talk at the Pacific Astronomy and Telescope Show, 14 September 2008 (recording).

By his own count he had figured about 15 mirrors of 12 inches and 2 of 18 inches before he left the monastery, and a lot of smaller ones. He made them for other people, and even the ones he made for himself did not stay under the roof he slept under.1818.Mayer 1980, p. 26-27; Contra Costa Times 1969.his own accountMayer 1980: Ben Mayer, “Astronomy on the Sidewalk” (interview with John Dobson), Astronomy, April 1980, pp. 24-28.his own accountContra Costa Times 1969: Vicki Allen, “John Dobson Helps People See The Moon”, Contra Costa Times, 12 February 1969, p. 16A (California Digital Newspaper Collection).

Asked once whether his first telescope had become the Dobson mount, he said, “It was an ancestor; we do it much better now.” He described the mount in print in 1973, six years after he left. In that description the tube sat in a plywood box with a round bearing on each side, the bearings rested in notches in a three-sided rocker box, and the rocker box turned on three pieces of Teflon. The name is in print by the summer of 1979, when a magazine editor told readers where “Dobsonian” came from.1919.Mayer 1980, p. 25; Dobson 1973, p. 11; Telescope Making 1979.his own accountMayer 1980: Ben Mayer, “Astronomy on the Sidewalk” (interview with John Dobson), Astronomy, April 1980, pp. 24-28.his own accountDobson 1973: John Dobson, “A Simple Design for Building Large Reflectors”, Celestial Observer 4:3, July-September 1973, p. 11.record from the timeTelescope Making 1979: Telescope Making no. 4, Summer 1979.

Some of the children who had looked through a borrowed telescope wanted one of their own, and before long many of them were making telescopes, which took a lot of tubes. He handed the errand to one child’s mother, who went to the supplier with “a pan of brownies” and came back with plenty, and after that the supplier would not give him any.2020.The Astronomers 1991, at 00:05:12; Telescope Making 1983, p. 44; Riverside talk, web text.his own accountThe Astronomers 1991: The Astronomers (KCET/PBS, 1991), episode 1, “Where Is the Rest of the Universe?” (recording).his own accountTelescope Making 1983: “Dobson on Dobsonians”, his Riverside talk of May 1983, Telescope Making no. 20, pp. 43ff.his own accountRiverside talk, web text: “Dobson on Dobsonians”, transcript of his 1983 Riverside talk, sidewalkastronomers.us.

One little boy who was grinding a mirror kept wiping his hands on his pants and running them through his hair until he sparkled with grit all over. Dobson made him put on clean clothes and shower every time he moved to a finer grade.2121.Telescope Building film, at 00:09:09, 00:09:17.his own accountTelescope Building film: Telescope Building with John Dobson, instructional film, about 1992 (recording).

Asked whether the monastery had encouraged his telescope making, he said no, “because it wasn’t part of our curriculum.” Some of the messages that went between Sacramento and the main monastery in San Francisco were open, where anybody could read them, so he and his friends there used a code. A telescope was a geranium. Potted meant it was in its tube and its rocker, and in bloom meant the mirror had been aluminized or silvered.2222.Sky at Night 2006; Anecdotes.his own accountSky at Night 2006: Interview with John Dobson, BBC Sky at Night Magazine, December 2006.his own accountAnecdotes: John Dobson, “Memories” (anecdotes), sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).

“So if I said I’ve got a 12-inch, potted geranium in bloom, they knew I had a finished telescope.” Nobody who carried the notes, he wrote, knew what they were about.2323.Sky at Night 2006; Anecdotes.his own accountSky at Night 2006: Interview with John Dobson, BBC Sky at Night Magazine, December 2006.his own accountAnecdotes: John Dobson, “Memories” (anecdotes), sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).

In the evening he would get on an old bicycle and ride the streets, sending everyone he met to the house where the telescope was. On some clear evenings, Levy wrote, he went out with the 12-inch on top of a station wagon and offered a look to whoever was passing.2424.Moser 1989, pp. 102-110; Levy 1995.a later writerMoser 1989: Don Moser, “John Dobson, the celestial Pied Piper”, Smithsonian, April 1989, pp. 102-110.a later writerLevy 1995: David H. Levy, “Walden of the Sky”, Sky & Telescope, September 1995, p. 84.

He took the telescope around by day when the Moon was near first quarter. His own first look at the Moon through a telescope had started all of this, with the thought that everyone had to see that. Most people have never seen it that way, he said, “and they are shocked when they see it so close up.” What else he showed them then is not known. “I didn’t just let them look, I told them what they were looking at,” he said. “That was the important part.”2525.Mayer 1980, p. 27; Contra Costa Times 1969; Sky at Night 2006; Oregonian 2003.his own accountMayer 1980: Ben Mayer, “Astronomy on the Sidewalk” (interview with John Dobson), Astronomy, April 1980, pp. 24-28.his own accountContra Costa Times 1969: Vicki Allen, “John Dobson Helps People See The Moon”, Contra Costa Times, 12 February 1969, p. 16A (California Digital Newspaper Collection).his own accountSky at Night 2006: Interview with John Dobson, BBC Sky at Night Magazine, December 2006.his own accountOregonian 2003: Richard Hill, “Telescopic Visionary”, The Oregonian, April 2003.

Years before, Swami Ashokananda had given him and another monk “the task of putting science and Vedanta together”. He reasoned that if the philosophers are right and the scientists are right about this world, which is the only one there is to talk about, then the two of them have to agree. And you have to see the universe before you can understand it.2626.Memoir 3; Stavig 2019, p. 7; Mayer 1980, p. 24, p. 25.his own accountMemoir 3: John Dobson, “Memoir 3”, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).a later writerStavig 2019: Gopal Stavig, “Ramakrishna-Vedanta in Southern California”, part VIII, “John Dobson” (2019).his own accountMayer 1980: Ben Mayer, “Astronomy on the Sidewalk” (interview with John Dobson), Astronomy, April 1980, pp. 24-28.

Swami Vivekananda, he wrote, had wanted spiritual aspirants to carry magic lanterns from one village to the next and teach the villagers science. Then he added, “We were doing what we could.”2727.Anecdotes.his own accountAnecdotes: John Dobson, “Memories” (anecdotes), sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).

A monk was not supposed to be away without leave. Dobson wheeled the telescope around in the daytime, and at night, by his own account, he slipped out to the eyepiece, and did it often. His own word for it was the army’s, AWOL. Moser wrote that he would go over the fence to run the telescope and that his superiors did not like it.2828.A Sidewalk Astronomer, at 00:22:58; Mayer 1980, p. 27; Oregonian 2003; Moser 1989, pp. 102-110.his own accountA Sidewalk Astronomer: A Sidewalk Astronomer (film, dir. Jeffrey Fox Jacobs, 2005), from the distributor’s published transcript (paraphrased).his own accountMayer 1980: Ben Mayer, “Astronomy on the Sidewalk” (interview with John Dobson), Astronomy, April 1980, pp. 24-28.his own accountOregonian 2003: Richard Hill, “Telescopic Visionary”, The Oregonian, April 2003.a later writerMoser 1989: Don Moser, “John Dobson, the celestial Pied Piper”, Smithsonian, April 1989, pp. 102-110.

For all the code, he said late in life that everybody in the monastery knew he was helping people make telescopes. The objection, his club’s biography says, was that the telescopes were seen as taking time from his duties as a monk. The trouble, as he told it, was being gone. “In the military, they just shoot you,” he said. “In the monastery, it’s much worse. In the monastery, if you’re AWOL, they presume that you did it.”2929.Sky at Night 2006; A Sidewalk Astronomer, at 00:22:58; Club biography; Space.com 2000; Moser 1989, pp. 102-110.his own accountSky at Night 2006: Interview with John Dobson, BBC Sky at Night Magazine, December 2006.his own accountA Sidewalk Astronomer: A Sidewalk Astronomer (film, dir. Jeffrey Fox Jacobs, 2005), from the distributor’s published transcript (paraphrased).a later writerClub biography: “John Dobson: A Brief Biography”, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).his own accountSpace.com 2000: Space.com profile of John Dobson, May 2000 (reprinted on sidewalkastronomers.us).a later writerMoser 1989: Don Moser, “John Dobson, the celestial Pied Piper”, Smithsonian, April 1989, pp. 102-110.

When the children started asking for telescopes of their own, he thought that helping them make them would get him thrown out. Levy prints his reasoning in his own words: he could tell the children to go to hell or risk his place in the monastery, and “I wasn’t going to tell them to go to hell.” Levy also wrote that he was warned to stop making telescopes or be expelled, and that he “desperately wanted to stay”.3030.The Astronomers 1991, at 00:05:12, 00:05:20; Levy 1995.his own accountThe Astronomers 1991: The Astronomers (KCET/PBS, 1991), episode 1, “Where Is the Rest of the Universe?” (recording).a later writerLevy 1995: David H. Levy, “Walden of the Sky”, Sky & Telescope, September 1995, p. 84.

By his own word he did not choose to go. It ended in 1967, after 9 years in Sacramento and 23 as a monk. Some of his tellings put it down to everything he had been doing for years. “I was AWOL from the monastery a little too often, so they kicked me out,” he said, and Moser had the same reason from him. On television it was the children: he was thrown out, he said, for helping them make telescopes.3131.Oregonian 2003; Memoir 3; Stavig 2019, p. 7; Moser 1989, pp. 102-110; The Astronomers 1991, at 00:05:20, 00:05:31.his own accountOregonian 2003: Richard Hill, “Telescopic Visionary”, The Oregonian, April 2003.his own accountMemoir 3: John Dobson, “Memoir 3”, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).a later writerStavig 2019: Gopal Stavig, “Ramakrishna-Vedanta in Southern California”, part VIII, “John Dobson” (2019).a later writerMoser 1989: Don Moser, “John Dobson, the celestial Pied Piper”, Smithsonian, April 1989, pp. 102-110.his own accountThe Astronomers 1991: The Astronomers (KCET/PBS, 1991), episode 1, “Where Is the Rest of the Universe?” (recording).

Other tellings put it down to one day. In 2000 he gave a reporter both, the absences and the day, and insisted that on the day he was put out he was simply reading outside the walls. In two later interviews and in his memoir he was weeding by the wall and was reported missing. “I was asked to leave the monastery, and that whole thing was an accident,” he said.3232.Space.com 2000; Crater Lake interview, transcript; Sky at Night 2006; Memoir 3.his own accountSpace.com 2000: Space.com profile of John Dobson, May 2000 (reprinted on sidewalkastronomers.us).his own accountCrater Lake interview, transcript: F. Owen Hoffman’s own transcript of the same 31 July 2004 interview, posted before the edit.his own accountSky at Night 2006: Interview with John Dobson, BBC Sky at Night Magazine, December 2006.his own accountMemoir 3: John Dobson, “Memoir 3”, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).

In the memoir it was one of the brothers who could not find him on the 7 acres, and he was weeding on the strip between the front wall and the sidewalk with a woman he calls Mrs. Vitt and her two children. He was asked to leave, the memoir says, “because someone couldn’t find me one day on our seven acre plot”.3333.Memoir 3.his own accountMemoir 3: John Dobson, “Memoir 3”, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).

Weeding or reading, we have no account of that day except his. Both kinds of telling may be true: years of nights out and telescopes for the children, and then a last occasion.3434.Space.com 2000; Crater Lake interview, transcript; Sky at Night 2006; Memoir 3; The Astronomers 1991, at 00:05:20.his own accountSpace.com 2000: Space.com profile of John Dobson, May 2000 (reprinted on sidewalkastronomers.us).his own accountCrater Lake interview, transcript: F. Owen Hoffman’s own transcript of the same 31 July 2004 interview, posted before the edit.his own accountSky at Night 2006: Interview with John Dobson, BBC Sky at Night Magazine, December 2006.his own accountMemoir 3: John Dobson, “Memoir 3”, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).his own accountThe Astronomers 1991: The Astronomers (KCET/PBS, 1991), episode 1, “Where Is the Rest of the Universe?” (recording).

Being put out felt to him, at the time, worse than death. The worst that could happen to him already had, he said, so “what can death do to me now”, and the feeling lasted a long time. More than 30 years later he had come to feel that the job he was given could not have been done if he had stayed in the monastery. “I got that job done.”3535.Space.com 2000.his own accountSpace.com 2000: Space.com profile of John Dobson, May 2000 (reprinted on sidewalkastronomers.us).

He did not leave Vedanta.3636.SRV Association 2014; Stavig 2019, p. 7.a later writerSRV Association 2014: SRV Association, “In Memoriam: John Dobson”, srv.org, 2014.a later writerStavig 2019: Gopal Stavig, “Ramakrishna-Vedanta in Southern California”, part VIII, “John Dobson” (2019).

A memorial page from the SRV Association says that after 1967 he stayed close to the order and came back often to lecture. Starting in 1978, and for months at a stretch over the following decades, he stayed at the Vedanta Society of Southern California and taught cosmology classes there. He spent his last years in its monastery in Hollywood.3737.SRV Association 2014; Stavig 2019, p. 7.a later writerSRV Association 2014: SRV Association, “In Memoriam: John Dobson”, srv.org, 2014.a later writerStavig 2019: Gopal Stavig, “Ramakrishna-Vedanta in Southern California”, part VIII, “John Dobson” (2019).

He went with a $50 bill and nothing else, The Oregonian reported, and the press biography says he hitchhiked to San Francisco and got some of his telescopes back from Sacramento. He was fresh out of the monastery, he said, “and had no place to stay, so friends would put me up one after the other.” For lunch he ate weeds and wildflowers, and his friends fed him the rest of the time. Moser wrote that he slept on a rug in a friend’s house.3838.Oregonian 2003; NYT obituary 2014; Film press biography; LA Times obituary 2014; Mayer 1980, p. 28; Moser 1989, pp. 102-110.his own accountOregonian 2003: Richard Hill, “Telescopic Visionary”, The Oregonian, April 2003.a later writerNYT obituary 2014: Douglas Martin, obituary of John Dobson, New York Times News Service, January 2014.a later writerFilm press biography: Press biography for the film A Sidewalk Astronomer (2005), telescopepictures.com.a later writerLA Times obituary 2014: Elaine Woo, obituary of John Dobson, Los Angeles Times, January 2014.his own accountMayer 1980: Ben Mayer, “Astronomy on the Sidewalk” (interview with John Dobson), Astronomy, April 1980, pp. 24-28.a later writerMoser 1989: Don Moser, “John Dobson, the celestial Pied Piper”, Smithsonian, April 1989, pp. 102-110.

The telescope he set up on clear nights at the corner of Jackson and Broderick Streets, Levy wrote, was Stellatrope, the 12-inch with the hose-reel tube. By the first week of January 1968 the city’s Jewish weekly was listing him: a free star party at the Jewish Community Center on Monday the 8th, with Dobson and a group of telescope enthusiasts bringing the telescopes. A week later it listed an 8-session course of his on making a powerful telescope cheaply.3939.Levy 1995; Telescope Making 1983, p. 45; Listings, p. 10.a later writerLevy 1995: David H. Levy, “Walden of the Sky”, Sky & Telescope, September 1995, p. 84.his own accountTelescope Making 1983: “Dobson on Dobsonians”, his Riverside talk of May 1983, Telescope Making no. 20, pp. 43ff.record from the timeListings: Class, event and broadcast listings in California newspapers, 1968 to 2001 (California Digital Newspaper Collection).

On January 19 the same paper ran a story about the corner. On clear evenings for some weeks past, hundreds of people, children and adults, had been looking through a 12-inch telescope at Jackson and Broderick, and some of them, aged 9 to 60, were now grinding and polishing mirrors of their own. The telescopes were built mostly out of things from junk shops and surplus stores.4040.J., 19 Jan 1968.record from the timeJ., 19 Jan 1968: “S.F. Star Gazers Make Their Own Telescopes”, J. The Jewish News of Northern California, 19 January 1968 (California Digital Newspaper Collection).

The man behind it was a chemist by training whose hobby was making telescopes. Many people, the paper said, knew him as “Telescope John”.4141.J., 19 Jan 1968.record from the timeJ., 19 Jan 1968: “S.F. Star Gazers Make Their Own Telescopes”, J. The Jewish News of Northern California, 19 January 1968 (California Digital Newspaper Collection).

1. His tellings of the leaving, in date order. 1969: nothing on leaving. 1980: the night outings, and nothing on why he left. 1989 (Smithsonian): the absences. 1991 (the PBS series) and 1995 (Sky & Telescope): helping the children. 2000 (Space.com): the absences, and reading outside the walls on the day. 2003 (The Oregonian): the absences. 2004 (an interview at Crater Lake): weeding outside the front wall, reported missing. 2006 (Sky at Night Magazine): weeding next to the monastery wall, a man sent to look for him, “an accident”. The memoir, undated and late: weeding on the strip by the sidewalk, a brother reporting him missing, with Mrs. Vitt and her two children. Our text of the 2005 film does not settle whether he says weeding or reading. Only Levy says “warned”, citing Sky & Telescope for November 1989, which we have not seen; the Los Angeles Times obituary, Astronomy in 2001, Wikipedia and a 2014 Space.com obituary come close to a warning or a choice put to him. Every source with a year says 1967, except a 2005 Los Angeles Times profile with 1958, the year of the move.4242.Contra Costa Times 1969; Mayer 1980, p. 27; Moser 1989, pp. 102-110; The Astronomers 1991, at 00:05:20; Levy 1995; Space.com 2000; Oregonian 2003; Crater Lake interview, transcript; Sky at Night 2006; Memoir 3; A Sidewalk Astronomer, at 00:23:20, 00:23:31; LA Times obituary 2014; Sullivant 2001, p. 72; Wikipedia; Space.com obituary 2014; LA Times 2005.his own accountContra Costa Times 1969: Vicki Allen, “John Dobson Helps People See The Moon”, Contra Costa Times, 12 February 1969, p. 16A (California Digital Newspaper Collection).his own accountMayer 1980: Ben Mayer, “Astronomy on the Sidewalk” (interview with John Dobson), Astronomy, April 1980, pp. 24-28.a later writerMoser 1989: Don Moser, “John Dobson, the celestial Pied Piper”, Smithsonian, April 1989, pp. 102-110.his own accountThe Astronomers 1991: The Astronomers (KCET/PBS, 1991), episode 1, “Where Is the Rest of the Universe?” (recording).a later writerLevy 1995: David H. Levy, “Walden of the Sky”, Sky & Telescope, September 1995, p. 84.his own accountSpace.com 2000: Space.com profile of John Dobson, May 2000 (reprinted on sidewalkastronomers.us).his own accountOregonian 2003: Richard Hill, “Telescopic Visionary”, The Oregonian, April 2003.his own accountCrater Lake interview, transcript: F. Owen Hoffman’s own transcript of the same 31 July 2004 interview, posted before the edit.his own accountSky at Night 2006: Interview with John Dobson, BBC Sky at Night Magazine, December 2006.his own accountMemoir 3: John Dobson, “Memoir 3”, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).his own accountA Sidewalk Astronomer: A Sidewalk Astronomer (film, dir. Jeffrey Fox Jacobs, 2005), from the distributor’s published transcript (paraphrased).a later writerLA Times obituary 2014: Elaine Woo, obituary of John Dobson, Los Angeles Times, January 2014.a later writerSullivant 2001: Rosemary Sullivant, “On the Road with John Dobson”, Astronomy, September 2001.a later writerWikipedia: “John Dobson (amateur astronomer)”, Wikipedia (revision of 2026).a later writerSpace.com obituary 2014: Mark Thompson, obituary of John Dobson, Space.com, January 2014.a later writerLA Times 2005: Hugo Martin, “Astronomer a star in his profession”, Los Angeles Times, 2005.

2. The 2004 interview has two texts. The interviewer’s own transcript, posted that October, has “shifted” and “I left”, and the sentence about the weeding. The text on the Crater Lake Institute’s site, edited in December 2005, has “went” and “expelled”, and the weeding is gone. That is also the word in the New York Times and San Francisco Chronicle obituaries. His own verbs elsewhere were asked to leave, thrown out and kicked out. We have not heard the tape.4343.Crater Lake interview, transcript; Crater Lake interview, edited; NYT obituary 2014; SF Chronicle obituary 2014; Sky at Night 2006; The Astronomers 1991, at 00:05:31; Oregonian 2003.his own accountCrater Lake interview, transcript: F. Owen Hoffman’s own transcript of the same 31 July 2004 interview, posted before the edit.his own accountCrater Lake interview, edited: F. Owen Hoffman, interview with John Dobson, 31 July 2004, Crater Lake Institute oral history, edited by Stephen R. Mark (December 2005).a later writerNYT obituary 2014: Douglas Martin, obituary of John Dobson, New York Times News Service, January 2014.a later writerSF Chronicle obituary 2014: David Perlman, obituary of John Dobson, San Francisco Chronicle (SFGate), January 2014.his own accountSky at Night 2006: Interview with John Dobson, BBC Sky at Night Magazine, December 2006.his own accountThe Astronomers 1991: The Astronomers (KCET/PBS, 1991), episode 1, “Where Is the Rest of the Universe?” (recording).his own accountOregonian 2003: Richard Hill, “Telescopic Visionary”, The Oregonian, April 2003.

3. The legends and who tells them. That the portholes came into the monastery hidden in fertilizer boxes is in a Klamath Falls newspaper story of 2004 and in his club’s biography; the Los Angeles Times obituary has telescope parts in the boxes. That the monastery had one of his telescopes thrown into San Francisco Bay was printed by Moser in 1989, called a rumor by Levy in 1995, and repeated in 2005 and 2014 as part of his dismissal. Neither story is in any telling of his own that we have read. The film’s press biography says the monks “could not imagine that that was all he was doing” on his nights out, and only Utne Reader (2009) has him “secretly grinding mirrors in the bathroom after curfew”. Those are the writers’ words, and no account from the monastery says what the monks believed.4444.Herald and News 2004; Club biography; LA Times obituary 2014; Moser 1989, pp. 102-110; Levy 1995; LA Times 2005; Regas 2014; Film press biography; Reilly 2009.a later writerHerald and News 2004: Lee Juillerat, “Pied Piper of Astronomy”, Herald and News (Klamath Falls), July 2004.a later writerClub biography: “John Dobson: A Brief Biography”, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).a later writerLA Times obituary 2014: Elaine Woo, obituary of John Dobson, Los Angeles Times, January 2014.a later writerMoser 1989: Don Moser, “John Dobson, the celestial Pied Piper”, Smithsonian, April 1989, pp. 102-110.a later writerLevy 1995: David H. Levy, “Walden of the Sky”, Sky & Telescope, September 1995, p. 84.a later writerLA Times 2005: Hugo Martin, “Astronomer a star in his profession”, Los Angeles Times, 2005.a later writerRegas 2014: Dean Regas, “The Astronomer Who Showed Us the Sky”, HuffPost, 2014 (from his 2005 interview).a later writerFilm press biography: Press biography for the film A Sidewalk Astronomer (2005), telescopepictures.com.a later writerReilly 2009: Doug Reilly, “Obscene Astronomy and Street-Smart Stargazing”, Utne Reader online, 2009.

4. The telescopes and the mount: dates. The tellings of his that were read for this part put a cardboard tube, a rocker and wheels in Sacramento, and no more of the mount than that. The 1973 article adds a tube of the kind made for pouring concrete pillars and a ground board under the Teflon. Telescope Making for summer 1979 ran an article headed “The Dobsonian Telescope”. The press biography calls the Sacramento telescopes the origin of the Dobsonian mount; that is its claim. Moser and Dobson’s 2008 talk put the jug mirrors and the garden sand in Sacramento, and Levy puts the jugs, the screened sand and the homemade rouge in San Francisco. His 1980 count is of mirrors figured; Levy and a 2002 newsletter make them finished telescopes. That the 24.5-inch window became the 24-inch is a guess, not a record.4545.Sky at Night 2006; Mayer 1980, p. 27, p. 26-27; Dobson 1973, p. 11; Telescope Making 1979; Film press biography; Moser 1989, pp. 102-110; PATS talk 2008, at 00:22:56, 00:16:28, 00:16:59; Levy 1995; Orwell newsletter 2002.his own accountSky at Night 2006: Interview with John Dobson, BBC Sky at Night Magazine, December 2006.his own accountMayer 1980: Ben Mayer, “Astronomy on the Sidewalk” (interview with John Dobson), Astronomy, April 1980, pp. 24-28.his own accountDobson 1973: John Dobson, “A Simple Design for Building Large Reflectors”, Celestial Observer 4:3, July-September 1973, p. 11.record from the timeTelescope Making 1979: Telescope Making no. 4, Summer 1979.a later writerFilm press biography: Press biography for the film A Sidewalk Astronomer (2005), telescopepictures.com.a later writerMoser 1989: Don Moser, “John Dobson, the celestial Pied Piper”, Smithsonian, April 1989, pp. 102-110.his own accountPATS talk 2008: John Dobson, “Einstein’s Geometry”, talk at the Pacific Astronomy and Telescope Show, 14 September 2008 (recording).a later writerLevy 1995: David H. Levy, “Walden of the Sky”, Sky & Telescope, September 1995, p. 84.a later writerOrwell newsletter 2002: Neil Morley, on his visit to Orwell Park Observatory, 29 September 2002, Orwell Astronomical Society newsletter, November 2002.

5. Searches made and not made. The Sacramento Union is in the free California Digital Newspaper Collection through 30 April 1966, the Roseville Press-Tribune for all of these years. These were keyword searches of scanned text: 276 snippets with his surname (238 in the Union, 38 in the Press-Tribune) and 601 with the word telescope were read, and none is about him, the monks or their telescopes. The Sacramento Bee is not in that collection and has not been searched, and the Union from May 1966 on is not online. The Sacramento center’s own history does not name him. The one trace from the time is a June 1962 photograph, known to us only from its caption in a 2001 book, itself seen only as a search snippet, which names him among the Sacramento brothers. The films, the PBS series and the 2008 talk are paraphrased from transcripts, not yet checked by ear.4646.Sacramento Union 1964-66, p. 24; Vedanta Society of Sacramento; Brown 2001, p. 192; A Sidewalk Astronomer, at 00:22:58; The Astronomers 1991, at 00:05:20; PATS talk 2008, at 00:22:56; Telescope Building film, at 00:09:09.record from the timeSacramento Union 1964-66: Sacramento Daily Union items on the Vedanta Society’s Carmichael center, November 1964 to April 1966 (California Digital Newspaper Collection).a later writerVedanta Society of Sacramento: Vedanta Society of Sacramento, “Our Story” and “Resident Swamis” (web pages).a later writerBrown 2001: Shelley Brown, Centred in Truth: the Story of Swami Nitya-swarup-ananda (2001); captions read as search snippets only.his own accountA Sidewalk Astronomer: A Sidewalk Astronomer (film, dir. Jeffrey Fox Jacobs, 2005), from the distributor’s published transcript (paraphrased).his own accountThe Astronomers 1991: The Astronomers (KCET/PBS, 1991), episode 1, “Where Is the Rest of the Universe?” (recording).his own accountPATS talk 2008: John Dobson, “Einstein’s Geometry”, talk at the Pacific Astronomy and Telescope Show, 14 September 2008 (recording).his own accountTelescope Building film: Telescope Building with John Dobson, instructional film, about 1992 (recording).