Part 5. San Francisco, 1967 to 1977: the Sidewalk Astronomers and the national parks

The eyepiece there was high enough that people climbed onto the lid of a litter can to reach it. Some of them jumped up and down on the can when they saw Saturn and pounded Dobson on the shoulder, and one can was destroyed. One night late in 1968, David Perlman wrote, a mother in Pacific Heights saw him in a crowd of children and telephoned the police. They came, he offered them a look too, and they took it and left satisfied.55.Mayer 1980, p. 28; The Telescope Man, at 00:01:10; Fresh Air 1991, at 00:09:21; Perlman 2000; SF Chronicle obituary 2014.his own accountMayer 1980: Ben Mayer, “Astronomy on the Sidewalk” (interview with John Dobson), Astronomy, April 1980, pp. 24-28.his own accountThe Telescope Man: “JD: The Telescope Man”, documentary short, undated (recording).his own accountFresh Air 1991: Fresh Air, Terry Gross, “Sidewalk Astronomer John Dobson”, NPR, 1 May 1991 (recording).a later writerPerlman 2000: David Perlman, “A Star Among Astronomers”, San Francisco Chronicle, about December 2000 (reprinted on sidewalkastronomers.us).a later writerSF Chronicle obituary 2014: David Perlman, obituary of John Dobson, San Francisco Chronicle (SFGate), January 2014.

When he had a telescope to spare, he wheeled it down the street and asked the children whether they wanted to borrow it. The mothers, he said, usually took him for a dirty old man. One mother telephoned him herself. Her son had twice sat through the Morrison Planetarium’s course in astronomy and wanted more, and “Brucie,” as she called him, “needs someone to talk to about telescopes and about astronomy.”66.Contra Costa Times 1969; Telescope Making 1983, p. 45; Riverside talk, web text.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 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.

The boy was Bruce Sams, and in the pictures Dobson showed years later he is 9 years old. When his 10.5-inch telescope was finished he became Dobson’s assistant in the class at the Jewish Community Center, “but he was so small they wouldn’t listen to what he said; so I gave them a tongue lashing.” When Bruce was 13, Dobson said, he made an 18-inch telescope that took first prize at the California State Science Fair.77.Telescope Making 1983, p. 45; Riverside talk, web text.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.

The city’s astronomy club, Dobson said, would not let the boy join until he was 14. So they talked it over and decided to start a club of their own. That was in 1968. It was the San Francisco Sidewalk Astronomers, or the Sidewalk Astronomers for short, and at the beginning it meant 3 members and 2 telescopes, out on the sidewalk on every clear night.88.Sky at Night 2006; Crater Lake interview, transcript; Planetary Radio 2012, at 00:19:32; Echo-Times 1969; Oakland Tribune, 10 Feb 1971.his own accountSky at Night 2006: Interview with John Dobson, BBC Sky at Night Magazine, December 2006.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 accountPlanetary Radio 2012: Planetary Radio, Mat Kaplan, “A Conversation With Telescope Inventor John Dobson”, recorded 4 August 2012, broadcast 10 September 2012 (recording).record from the timeEcho-Times 1969: “What’s Happening”, item “Telescope Making”, Echo-Times (College of Marin), 26 September 1969 (California Digital Newspaper Collection).record from the timeOakland Tribune, 10 Feb 1971: “Shadow On the Moon”, photograph and caption, Oakland Tribune, 10 February 1971, p. 6 (California Digital Newspaper Collection).

By Dobson’s count the first three were Bruce Sams, Jeff Roloff and himself, and Bruce “is the person on whose account the Sidewalk Astronomers were founded.” Rhodes had it a little differently. In his memoir Dobson founded the group with two young boys, Bruce Sams and another, neither of whom Rhodes ever met. The Jeff Roloff he knew was a university student of geology who went along on many of their trips.99.Telescope Making 1983, p. 45; Riverside talk, web text; Rhodes memoir.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.someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.

Late in life Dobson told how the name was found, and that time he gave ages and no names: a 9-year-old, a 17-year-old and himself at 53. The 17-year-old asked what they should call themselves and tried out several names, and when he got to sidewalk astronomers, Dobson said that was the one.1010.Planetary Radio 2012, at 00:11:47, 00:12:02.his own accountPlanetary Radio 2012: Planetary Radio, Mat Kaplan, “A Conversation With Telescope Inventor John Dobson”, recorded 4 August 2012, broadcast 10 September 2012 (recording).

The trouble with the corner was that few people walk around Pacific Heights at night. So they started taking the telescopes down to Ghirardelli Square, where about 2,000 people a weekend looked through them, and Rhodes wrote that they never went back. By its fourth year the club had 60 members.1111.Rhodes memoir; Oregonian 2003.someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.his own accountOregonian 2003: Richard Hill, “Telescopic Visionary”, The Oregonian, April 2003.

By February 1969 Dobson was living at Baker and Bush. Rhodes knew him in the basement of 1600 Baker Street, which was packed with the family belongings of the man who owned the house, a large snooker table among them. Dobson had a small room in one corner. War-surplus optics, portholes, books and boxes were piled up in it, along with a tiny foot-pumped organ, and he loved to sing Sanskrit songs of praise at it.1212.Contra Costa Times 1969; Rhodes memoir.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).someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.

The swami at a church in Berkeley, Rhodes wrote, liked to have him sing for the congregation, and he sang there many times and took the organ with him.1313.Rhodes memoir.someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.

He kept himself without a job so that he would be free for the telescopes. “I make telescopes for people who want to see the sky and have no means,” he said. By 1969 he drove 250 miles a week to classes in Redwood City, Walnut Creek and San Francisco, and by his count he had helped more than 100 people make telescopes.1414.Contra Costa Times 1969.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).

To hold the cost of a telescope with a 10.5-inch mirror to about $100, he supplied all the materials himself. The course at the Jewish Community Center ran for 8 sessions and cost $8 for members and $18 for everyone else. By October 1972 he had a class at the California Academy of Sciences as well, at $25 a family, and eventually it was teaching that supported him.1515.Contra Costa Times 1969; Listings; Academy Newsletter 1972; Club biography.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).record from the timeListings: Class, event and broadcast listings in California newspapers, 1968 to 2001 (California Digital Newspaper Collection).record from the timeAcademy Newsletter 1972: California Academy of Sciences, The Academy Newsletter no. 394, October 1972.a later writerClub biography: “John Dobson: A Brief Biography”, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).

Weekends went to Mount Tamalpais. For several years Rhodes, Dobson, Roloff and Joni Jackson hiked its trails every Saturday and Sunday, which was what Dobson wanted: the climb, the exercise and good food. Jackson helped him with the classes and the sidewalk astronomy, played the guitar, and had written a song on how the iron in our blood comes from exploded stars. On the trail the others asked him about the universe, physics and “of course nutrition”.1616.Rhodes memoir.someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.

“In our mirrors we’re recycling the Navy,” he said. A waterfront store in San Francisco was closing down, and by February 1969 he had borrowed $1,000 and “bought practically all the porthole glass in the city”, more than a ton, enough for a hundred 16-inch mirrors. Another time he bought over a ton more in Portland, Oregon, and Mel Bartels wrote that the dealers there remembered “Some white haired hippie from San Francisco” who had taken all the glass.1717.Telescope Making 1983, p. 45; Contra Costa Times 1969; Rhodes memoir; Bartels 2014.his own accountTelescope Making 1983: “Dobson on Dobsonians”, his Riverside talk of May 1983, Telescope Making no. 20, pp. 43ff.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).someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.a later writerBartels 2014: Mel Bartels, “Remembering John Dobson”, bbastrodesigns.com, January 2014.

Rhodes was a mechanic. After the 8-inch Dobson asked him whether he wanted to build a 16-inch next, and Rhodes said yes. He built it with a box for the tube to slide into and a tailgate hinged to the box, and it was named Cyclops. For a year or so it was the group’s workhorse, and Dobson called Rhodes the backbone of the Sidewalk Astronomers.1818.Mayer 1980, p. 27; Rhodes memoir.his own accountMayer 1980: Ben Mayer, “Astronomy on the Sidewalk” (interview with John Dobson), Astronomy, April 1980, pp. 24-28.someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.

In July 1969 they went up to Mount Shasta, where Dobson had built a 12-inch binocular telescope for a family and only the prisms were still to go in. On that trip they swam in Shasta Lake, Rhodes about 20 feet out and Dobson so far that Rhodes could barely see him. They had the binocular ready in time to try it on the day men first landed on the Moon. “We could not see the lander, but what a view,” Rhodes wrote.1919.Rhodes memoir.someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.

The 24-inch came about 1969 or 1970. Its mirror was a ship’s window with a focal length of 13 feet, which meant a 12-foot ladder for whoever was looking and a cardboard tube 30 inches across and 12 feet long. Neither man owned anything that would carry a 12-foot tube. They wanted it in two pieces, 8 feet and 4.2020.Death Valley report 1973; Club biography; Rhodes memoir; PATS talk 2008, at 00:16:59; Planetary Radio 2012, at 00:09:41, 00:14:36; The Night Sky, at 00:10:29; Crater Lake interview, edited.his own accountDeath Valley report 1973: John Dobson, “Dying Stars Viewed From Death Valley”, trip report (copyright 1973), quanta-gaia.org.a later writerClub biography: “John Dobson: A Brief Biography”, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.his own accountPATS talk 2008: John Dobson, “Einstein’s Geometry”, talk at the Pacific Astronomy and Telescope Show, 14 September 2008 (recording).his own accountPlanetary Radio 2012: Planetary Radio, Mat Kaplan, “A Conversation With Telescope Inventor John Dobson”, recorded 4 August 2012, broadcast 10 September 2012 (recording).his own accountThe Night Sky: The Night Sky, episode 4, “Conversation with John Dobson”, JPL Public Education Office, 1990s (recording).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).

As Dobson told it, he got to the tube company and found Rhodes already standing on the loading dock beside two lengths of 30-inch tube, one of 8 feet and one of 4. Neither of them had ordered anything. The pieces were offcuts from somebody else’s order that morning. He reckoned that such a thing happens at most once in 500 years, and not on the morning you need it, and he told Rhodes that something in this universe wanted that telescope.2121.PATS talk 2008, at 00:17:34, 00:17:44, 00:17:58; Planetary Radio 2012, at 00:15:13, 00:15:22.his own accountPATS talk 2008: John Dobson, “Einstein’s Geometry”, talk at the Pacific Astronomy and Telescope Show, 14 September 2008 (recording).his own accountPlanetary Radio 2012: Planetary Radio, Mat Kaplan, “A Conversation With Telescope Inventor John Dobson”, recorded 4 August 2012, broadcast 10 September 2012 (recording).

By Dobson’s count they made it in 3 months, for $300, and he gave Rhodes the credit for getting it finished. It sat, Rhodes wrote, on a mount built the way he built Cyclops. It weighed nearly 600 pounds, and its rocker rode on a converted trailer and took 4 people to get on and off. People said it looked like a cannon. “I really didn’t know that I was copying gun mounts when I invented this concept,” Dobson said. With money, he said late in life, he might have thought of something complicated.2222.Planetary Radio 2012, at 00:13:56, 00:13:47; Moser 1989, pp. 102-110; Crater Lake interview, edited; Rhodes memoir; Death Valley report 1973; Mayer 1980, p. 27.his own accountPlanetary Radio 2012: Planetary Radio, Mat Kaplan, “A Conversation With Telescope Inventor John Dobson”, recorded 4 August 2012, broadcast 10 September 2012 (recording).his own accountMoser 1989: Don Moser, “John Dobson, the celestial Pied Piper”, Smithsonian, April 1989, pp. 102-110.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).someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.his own accountDeath Valley report 1973: John Dobson, “Dying Stars Viewed From Death Valley”, trip report (copyright 1973), quanta-gaia.org.his own accountMayer 1980: Ben Mayer, “Astronomy on the Sidewalk” (interview with John Dobson), Astronomy, April 1980, pp. 24-28.

It was finished just in time for a trip to Death Valley, too late to have the mirror aluminized, so Dobson had it silvered. The silverers, he said, scrubbed the glass too hard and spoiled the edge of the curve. The group drove in through a blizzard in the Tehachapis that left 7,000 motorists stranded in the mountain passes. “We had the advantage of weight,” he wrote.2323.Rhodes memoir; Crater Lake interview, edited; Death Valley report 1973.someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.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).his own accountDeath Valley report 1973: John Dobson, “Dying Stars Viewed From Death Valley”, trip report (copyright 1973), quanta-gaia.org.

At Furnace Creek he tested the optics on the Sun reflected in a raven’s eye. The telescope sat through 5 nights of rain and wind on that first trip. Rhodes remembered the curve being put right after they got home, and Dobson said he had not finished refiguring it until the last day.2424.Rhodes memoir; Death Valley report 1973; Crater Lake interview, edited.someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.his own accountDeath Valley report 1973: John Dobson, “Dying Stars Viewed From Death Valley”, trip report (copyright 1973), quanta-gaia.org.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).

Paint was part of it from early on: in 1969 the group had a pink and orange 10.5-inch that Dobson called a giraffe. Later a company in the Mission District gave him 10 gallons of Day-Glo paint. They painted the 24-inch blue, with purple shapes done freehand, and he named it Delphinium.2525.Contra Costa Times 1969; Rhodes memoir.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).someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.

In the summer of 1969 Dobson had offered his methods to Sky & Telescope magazine. His mirrors were ground from ship’s porthole glass, which salvage outfits sold for much less than Pyrex blanks, and tested in the telescope itself, on the glint off an insulator. His tubes were cardboard, of the kind made for pouring concrete pillars, and each sat in a plywood box that rested in a rocker. The whole thing moved, he said, like a chair, or like a pair of eyes: around, and up and down.2626.King 2014; Dobson 1973, p. 11; Rhodes memoir; Planetary Radio 2012, at 00:13:29.a later writerKing 2014: Bob King, “John Dobson, Inventor of the Popular Dobsonian Telescope, Dead at 98”, Universe Today, 16 January 2014.his own accountDobson 1973: John Dobson, “A Simple Design for Building Large Reflectors”, Celestial Observer 4:3, July-September 1973, p. 11.someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.his own accountPlanetary Radio 2012: Planetary Radio, Mat Kaplan, “A Conversation With Telescope Inventor John Dobson”, recorded 4 August 2012, broadcast 10 September 2012 (recording).

He wanted easier, quicker and cheaper ways of working, he wrote later, so that a great many more people could look through bigger telescopes. The editor, Charles Federer, sent back a polite rejection. Techniques like his, the letter said, “could hardly lead to satisfactory instruments in the kind most amateurs want in these large sizes.” Porthole glass and makeshift wooden mountings were not things to recommend to thousands of other people, who lacked his knack of getting something “passable”.2727.Dobson 1973, p. 11; King 2014; Bartels 2014.his own accountDobson 1973: John Dobson, “A Simple Design for Building Large Reflectors”, Celestial Observer 4:3, July-September 1973, p. 11.a later writerKing 2014: Bob King, “John Dobson, Inventor of the Popular Dobsonian Telescope, Dead at 98”, Universe Today, 16 January 2014.a later writerBartels 2014: Mel Bartels, “Remembering John Dobson”, bbastrodesigns.com, January 2014.

We have the letter only as others quote it. As quoted, it grants Dobson his knack, and its worry is for the thousands of people who would try the same thing without it. Federer doubted, David Levy wrote, that plywood mountings and mirrors tested on a light bulb could be of use to a serious observer. For 1969 that was a reasonable doubt. It took telescopes built to this design, Bartels wrote, to show that large thin mirrors could pass the most rigorous optical tests.2828.King 2014; Bartels 2014; Levy 1995; Bartels, mirrors.a later writerKing 2014: Bob King, “John Dobson, Inventor of the Popular Dobsonian Telescope, Dead at 98”, Universe Today, 16 January 2014.a later writerBartels 2014: Mel Bartels, “Remembering John Dobson”, bbastrodesigns.com, January 2014.someone who was thereLevy 1995: David H. Levy, “Walden of the Sky”, Sky & Telescope, September 1995, p. 84.a later writerBartels, mirrors: Mel Bartels, “How good were John Dobson’s mirrors?”, bbastrodesigns.com, undated.

The telescope makers had a conference of their own, held in April at Riverside, and the group first went in 1970, with Rhodes’s 16-inch and some smaller telescopes. The 16-inch got a merit award, and first place for optical excellence went to a man who had made his telescope in one of Dobson’s classes. In 1971 the 24-inch was there, and Dobson won an award for optics, as did one of his students.2929.Rhodes memoir; Idyllwild report 1974; Bartels, mirrors; Dobson 1973, p. 11.someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.record from the timeIdyllwild report 1974: “Second Trip to Idyllwild”, Sidewalk Astronomers trip report on the Riverside Telescope Makers Conference, May 1974 (year inferred), sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).a later writerBartels, mirrors: Mel Bartels, “How good were John Dobson’s mirrors?”, bbastrodesigns.com, undated.his own accountDobson 1973: John Dobson, “A Simple Design for Building Large Reflectors”, Celestial Observer 4:3, July-September 1973, p. 11.

Not everyone at Riverside would look. Bartels wrote of a senior editor who refused the eyepiece altogether, on account of the wooden spider vanes, the unmachined construction and the psychedelic paint. Bartels himself vouched for the quality of the 12-, 18- and 24-inch mirrors, and added that Dobson sometimes worked with other people on the larger ones.3030.Bartels 2014; Bartels, mirrors.a later writerBartels 2014: Mel Bartels, “Remembering John Dobson”, bbastrodesigns.com, January 2014.a later writerBartels, mirrors: Mel Bartels, “How good were John Dobson’s mirrors?”, bbastrodesigns.com, undated.

The parks, as Dobson told it, came out of the trips to Riverside. The group made it a rule to go to a conference only if it could do sidewalk astronomy for the public on the way, usually at national parks and monuments. A breakdown would do as well. When his old van gave out near Buttonwillow, Rhodes went to work on the engine and Dobson put the Sun telescope out in the street, and by evening he had a date at the town’s only school.3131.Crater Lake interview, edited; Riverside talk, web text; Telescope Making 1983, p. 46.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).his own accountRiverside talk, web text: “Dobson on Dobsonians”, transcript of his 1983 Riverside talk, sidewalkastronomers.us.his own accountTelescope Making 1983: “Dobson on Dobsonians”, his Riverside talk of May 1983, Telescope Making no. 20, pp. 43ff.

The place Dobson wanted for the 24-inch was Glacier Point in Yosemite, and what he had against it was the hotel. He told Rhodes the hotel would spoil it. “We went there anyway and found that the hotel had just burned down.” The Glacier Point Hotel, damaged by a winter of heavy snow, had stayed shut for the summer of 1969, and on July 10 an electrical fire that started on its lower floor destroyed it.3232.Anecdotes; Riverside talk, web text; National Park Service, Glacier Point Hotel.his own accountAnecdotes: John Dobson, “Memories” (anecdotes), sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).his own accountRiverside talk, web text: “Dobson on Dobsonians”, transcript of his 1983 Riverside talk, sidewalkastronomers.us.a later writerNational Park Service, Glacier Point Hotel: National Park Service, “There may have never been a better balcony view than the one from the Glacier Point Hotel”, Historic Ashes series, nps.gov, undated.

Some of the wreckage went into the telescope. The spider mount of the 24-inch, which he called the black widow, was made of “garbage from the burned down hotel at Glacier Point.” The first time they set up there, a security ranger saw the telescope and ordered it taken down before dark. Dobson was ready to pack up and go, but “Brian had a cooler head than mine,” he wrote. Rhodes took the ranger to a telephone, they called the rangers on the valley floor, and the telescope stayed.3333.Riverside talk, web text; Telescope Making 1983, p. 46; Planetary Radio 2012, at 00:18:07, 00:18:25; Anecdotes; Crater Lake interview, edited.his own accountRiverside talk, web text: “Dobson on Dobsonians”, transcript of his 1983 Riverside talk, sidewalkastronomers.us.his own accountTelescope Making 1983: “Dobson on Dobsonians”, his Riverside talk of May 1983, Telescope Making no. 20, pp. 43ff.his own accountPlanetary Radio 2012: Planetary Radio, Mat Kaplan, “A Conversation With Telescope Inventor John Dobson”, recorded 4 August 2012, broadcast 10 September 2012 (recording).his own accountAnecdotes: John Dobson, “Memories” (anecdotes), sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).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).

Across 12 years the 24-inch stood at Glacier Point on more than a hundred nights. A stay usually ran 2 weeks. Shopping meant 6 miles down the hill and 6 miles back up, a climb of 3,000 feet, and Dobson remembered spending those dusty miles with a friend on the question of why all the particles of one kind are exactly alike. On the road the group sometimes slept in the telescopes when they were not set up. “And you can’t roll out of bed,” he said.3434.Anecdotes; Telescope Making 1983, p. 46; Crater Lake interview, edited; Rhodes memoir; Cosmology class 6, at 00:03:58, 00:04:15; Crater Lake interview, transcript.his own accountAnecdotes: John Dobson, “Memories” (anecdotes), sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).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).someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.his own accountCosmology class 6: John Dobson, cosmology class 6, audio recording, about 1994 (recording).his own accountCrater Lake interview, transcript: F. Owen Hoffman’s own transcript of the same 31 July 2004 interview, posted before the edit.

Winters were for Death Valley. Dobson’s report of one trip, dated 1973, has them arriving 3 nights before Christmas and leaving on the morning of New Year’s Day, after 9 days and nights with the telescopes out on the lawns and sidewalks of the Furnace Creek Visitor Center. Thousands of people came to look, and the rangers turned off the floodlights on the museum’s front wall so that faint things like the Horsehead and the Crab could be shown.3535.Mayer 1980, p. 28; Death Valley report 1973.his own accountMayer 1980: Ben Mayer, “Astronomy on the Sidewalk” (interview with John Dobson), Astronomy, April 1980, pp. 24-28.his own accountDeath Valley report 1973: John Dobson, “Dying Stars Viewed From Death Valley”, trip report (copyright 1973), quanta-gaia.org.

The same report says what the group was for. “The Sidewalk Astronomers are Astronomical Entertainers to Her Majesty the People-at-Large,” he wrote, and what was needed was millions of them, all over the world. “What we do for ourselves is a waste. What we do for others is beauty.”3636.Death Valley report 1973.his own accountDeath Valley report 1973: John Dobson, “Dying Stars Viewed From Death Valley”, trip report (copyright 1973), quanta-gaia.org.

A Death Valley ranger, Bill Clarke, made them unpaid employees of the monument, which gave them insurance cover and free camping. Before a slide show there someone once asked Dobson what he and the rangers had to do with each other. They did the same thing, he said: they entertained the public, the rangers with a park and he with telescopes.3737.Crater Lake interview, transcript; Crater Lake interview, edited; The Night Sky, at 00:04:09.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).his own accountThe Night Sky: The Night Sky, episode 4, “Conversation with John Dobson”, JPL Public Education Office, 1990s (recording).

Somewhere along the way a ranger told him that the sky was not a part of the park. “No, but the park is a part of the sky,” Dobson said.3838.Moser 1989, pp. 102-110; Crater Lake interview, edited.his own accountMoser 1989: Don Moser, “John Dobson, the celestial Pied Piper”, Smithsonian, April 1989, pp. 102-110.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).

On the night of January 2, 1974, hundreds of people went out to Ocean Beach hoping to see Comet Kohoutek and went home disappointed. Dobson was there with a telescope. “Never mind the comet for now,” he said. There was plenty of other “interesting jazz” up there, and he turned the telescope on Jupiter.3939.UPI, 3 Jan 1974.record from the timeUPI, 3 Jan 1974: United Press International, “Kohoutek Outing Disappointing To Observers”, Siskiyou News, 3 January 1974, p. 1 (California Digital Newspaper Collection).

One warm day that spring David Levy, visiting the California Academy of Sciences, noticed a collection of telescopes on its front portico, all aimed at the Sun, and in the middle of them “a frail-looking man in his late 50s”, shirtless, with a ponytail, explaining sunspots to a crowd. The telescopes outnumbered the people running them, so Levy helped for 2 hours. “Our only reason for being is to show the sky to the people,” Dobson told him. “Let other clubs do research with fancy telescopes.”4040.Levy 1995.someone who was thereLevy 1995: David H. Levy, “Walden of the Sky”, Sky & Telescope, September 1995, p. 84.

That May he was asked, unexpectedly, to speak at the telescope makers’ conference, held again at Idyllwild because of the smog at Riverside. The group took Bruce Sams’s 18-inch. On the first evening Dobson went down the hill for water, got talking with a troop of Indian Guides, agreed to tell their campfire about the constellations, and “didn’t get back till long after dark and in the company of perhaps 125 pairs of eyes.”4141.Idyllwild report 1974.record from the timeIdyllwild report 1974: “Second Trip to Idyllwild”, Sidewalk Astronomers trip report on the Riverside Telescope Makers Conference, May 1974 (year inferred), sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).

In March 1975 he wrote to ask that the master plan for Yosemite include a public observatory at Glacier Point. Protecting the right to see the sky, he argued, was as much the work of a national park as protecting the right to see a cliff, and his fear was that the site would be lost to “some disaster such as the building of another hotel”. On the ledge where the old one had stood he wanted a small roll-away building with no dome, housing a telescope of 24 or 30 inches for the public.4242.Glacier Point proposal 1975.his own accountGlacier Point proposal 1975: John Dobson, “The San Francisco Sidewalk Astronomers on the Improved Usage of the Glacier Point Area”, March 1975, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).

The group would supply the telescopes if the park would house them. The man in Yosemite who understood how it should be done, Dobson said, was the chief naturalist, Dave Karraker. Karraker’s own idea was telescopes along a path where the hotel had been, and the group sent on from one park to the next for “five grand a year.” Then Karraker left Yosemite, and the idea, Dobson said, was never really carried out.4343.Glacier Point proposal 1975; Crater Lake interview, transcript; Crater Lake interview, edited.his own accountGlacier Point proposal 1975: John Dobson, “The San Francisco Sidewalk Astronomers on the Improved Usage of the Glacier Point Area”, March 1975, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).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).

In May the 24-inch went to the Riverside conference and got a special award as the “light bucket” of 1975. From there, the group’s report says, “we fled to Mexico with the 24 incher,” its first trip abroad. The Astronomical Society of the Pacific had its meeting in Ensenada, and among the amateurs Dobson read a paper called “On the Rest Mass of Cuckoo Clocks”. We have its title and nothing more. The lesson he took from it, he wrote, was “Don’t joke with the professionals.”4444.Mexico report 1975; Anecdotes.record from the timeMexico report 1975: “The 24 Incher to Mexico”, Sidewalk Astronomers trip report, May 1975, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).his own accountAnecdotes: John Dobson, “Memories” (anecdotes), sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).

The same day, after a breakfast banquet for the astronomers, the Mayor of Ensenada asked the group to set the big telescope up that evening in the town’s Civic Plaza of the Monuments, and he put the militia on guard. The sky cleared for the first time since they had reached Mexico, and about 400 people looked at Saturn through the 24-inch while soldiers in steel hats stood by.4545.Mexico report 1975; Anecdotes.record from the timeMexico report 1975: “The 24 Incher to Mexico”, Sidewalk Astronomers trip report, May 1975, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).his own accountAnecdotes: John Dobson, “Memories” (anecdotes), sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).

That summer Yosemite’s naturalists invited them. The 24-inch went up at Glacier Point on June 28 and was in use on 16 nights. The naturalists handed out staff shirts and had a screen brought up from the valley floor, so that there could be slide shows at the Point before the telescopes.4646.Fremont Peak report 1975; Summer Tour 1976.record from the timeFremont Peak report 1975: “Fremont Peak and Glacier Point”, Sidewalk Astronomers report, 1975 (year inferred), sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).record from the timeSummer Tour 1976: “Summer Tour 1976”, Sidewalk Astronomers trip report in two parts (New Oraibi, the Grand Canyon, Yosemite), sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).

By 1976 the 24-inch traveled behind an old school bus, and Urania Hunter and her two children came along on many of the trips. The bus pulled out of San Francisco on June 14, 1976, bound for 10 days at the Grand Canyon, by invitation, and 10 more in Yosemite. The trip report calls it Starship “Centaurus A, armed with five telescopes and a small band of Sidewalk Astronomers”.4747.Rhodes memoir; Summer Tour 1976.someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.record from the timeSummer Tour 1976: “Summer Tour 1976”, Sidewalk Astronomers trip report in two parts (New Oraibi, the Grand Canyon, Yosemite), sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).

On the way it stopped at New Oraibi, on the Hopi reservation, where rain had defeated the group 2 years before, when it was coming home from the Grand Canyon. This time it worked. With the Governor’s permission they set up at the Community Center and stayed a day and a night, and in a village of about 500 people “just possibly, every kid in town, above the age of four, looked through the telescopes,” over and over until curfew.4848.Summer Tour 1976; Rhodes memoir.record from the timeSummer Tour 1976: “Summer Tour 1976”, Sidewalk Astronomers trip report in two parts (New Oraibi, the Grand Canyon, Yosemite), sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.

The children explained to the astronomers the flight of a nighthawk circling the parking lot after insects.4949.Summer Tour 1976.record from the timeSummer Tour 1976: “Summer Tour 1976”, Sidewalk Astronomers trip report in two parts (New Oraibi, the Grand Canyon, Yosemite), sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).

They got to the South Rim, at Yavapai Point, with the big telescope’s trailer badly broken down, and the park’s blacksmith welded its cracked beam. The telescopes stood 10 nights. Then the bus burned out its generator in a heat wave on the way into Needles and sat for 2 days and nights. After a night on the desert without headlights, and another above Fresno while the engine spat oil, they reached Glacier Point 3 days overdue.5050.Summer Tour 1976.record from the timeSummer Tour 1976: “Summer Tour 1976”, Sidewalk Astronomers trip report in two parts (New Oraibi, the Grand Canyon, Yosemite), sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).

The bus was still taking passengers in October 1977. A notice that month offered space on it to anyone going to a star party on Fremont Peak, where there would be a 24-inch telescope and a 22-inch to look through. The same notice invited the public to Ghirardelli Square, to watch a partial eclipse of the Sun through the group’s solar telescopes.5151.Noe Valley Voice 1977.record from the timeNoe Valley Voice 1977: “Eyeing the Eclipse”, Noe Valley Voice, October 1977.

Rhodes counted his years of getting telescopes out to the public as about 6, from 1968 to 1974, first on the sidewalk and then hauling the 24-inch to every star party and park and to the Hopi reservation. He put out a monthly newsletter, and he typed up about 4 of Dobson’s pieces on cosmology and physics and had about 50 copies of each printed and bound. “I never went to any star party without John,” he wrote. In 1977 he went to work full time, and after that he had little time left to help.5252.Rhodes memoir.someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.

1. Who founded the group, and when. Dobson named the three in his 1983 Riverside talk. On the radio in 2012 he gave ages and no names; only that interview has a 17-year-old choosing the name, and no source says who that was. Rhodes has Sams and a second boy, aged 9 to 12, and makes Roloff an 18-year-old student. Dobson, Levy and the club’s history give 1968; a 2014 obituary and the Smithsonian’s catalogue have 1967. The full name is in print by September 1969 and the short one by 1971; the club’s history dates the short name to 1976.5353.Telescope Making 1983, p. 45; Planetary Radio 2012, at 00:11:47, 00:12:02, 00:19:32; Rhodes memoir; Crater Lake interview, transcript; Levy 1995; Club history; Space.com obituary 2014; Smithsonian catalogue; Echo-Times 1969; Oakland Tribune, 10 Feb 1971.his own accountTelescope Making 1983: “Dobson on Dobsonians”, his Riverside talk of May 1983, Telescope Making no. 20, pp. 43ff.his own accountPlanetary Radio 2012: Planetary Radio, Mat Kaplan, “A Conversation With Telescope Inventor John Dobson”, recorded 4 August 2012, broadcast 10 September 2012 (recording).someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, 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.someone who was thereLevy 1995: David H. Levy, “Walden of the Sky”, Sky & Telescope, September 1995, p. 84.a later writerClub history: “About the Sidewalk Astronomers”, sidewalkastronomers.us.a later writerSpace.com obituary 2014: Mark Thompson, obituary of John Dobson, Space.com, January 2014.a later writerSmithsonian catalogue: National Museum of American History, catalogue entry for a Coulter Optical Dobsonian telescope (object 1994.0399.01).record from the timeEcho-Times 1969: “What’s Happening”, item “Telescope Making”, Echo-Times (College of Marin), 26 September 1969 (California Digital Newspaper Collection).record from the timeOakland Tribune, 10 Feb 1971: “Shadow On the Moon”, photograph and caption, Oakland Tribune, 10 February 1971, p. 6 (California Digital Newspaper Collection).

2. The police. The story is David Perlman’s, of the San Francisco Chronicle, told twice: about 2000 as a November night, one officer and the Moon, and in 2014 as a winter night, officers and Saturn. Both retell a Chronicle story of 1968 that we have not found.5454.Perlman 2000; SF Chronicle obituary 2014.a later writerPerlman 2000: David Perlman, “A Star Among Astronomers”, San Francisco Chronicle, about December 2000 (reprinted on sidewalkastronomers.us).a later writerSF Chronicle obituary 2014: David Perlman, obituary of John Dobson, San Francisco Chronicle (SFGate), January 2014.

3. The glass. In February 1969 the loan was $1,000 with no lender named, the glass more than a ton and the seller a waterfront store. In 1987 he spoke of four tons from American Salvage; The Oregonian in 2003 and his own talk in 2008 make the lender his mother and the glass four and a half tons. These may be one purchase remembered at different sizes, or several.5555.Contra Costa Times 1969; Telescope Making 1987; Oregonian 2003; PATS talk 2008, at 00:16:42.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 accountTelescope Making 1987: “Highlights of the 1987 Stellafane Convention”, Telescope Making no. 31, Winter 1987-88.his own accountOregonian 2003: Richard Hill, “Telescopic Visionary”, The Oregonian, April 2003.his own accountPATS talk 2008: John Dobson, “Einstein’s Geometry”, talk at the Pacific Astronomy and Telescope Show, 14 September 2008 (recording).

4. The 24-inch and the fire. About 1969 or 1970 rests on his 1973 report (the first Death Valley trip four years back), the club’s biography (a 24-inch by 1970) and Rhodes (no 24-inch at Riverside in April 1970). In 2004 Dobson said 1971, unsure whether Death Valley or Yosemite came first. The fire’s date is the National Park Service’s; his story of a hotel that had only just burned would put the first Glacier Point visit after July 1969. The three months and the loading dock are his own late tellings, and Rhodes’s memoir has neither.5656.Death Valley report 1973; Club biography; Rhodes memoir; Crater Lake interview, edited; Crater Lake interview, transcript; National Park Service, Glacier Point Hotel; Riverside talk, web text; Planetary Radio 2012, at 00:13:56, 00:15:13.his own accountDeath Valley report 1973: John Dobson, “Dying Stars Viewed From Death Valley”, trip report (copyright 1973), quanta-gaia.org.a later writerClub biography: “John Dobson: A Brief Biography”, sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.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).his own accountCrater Lake interview, transcript: F. Owen Hoffman’s own transcript of the same 31 July 2004 interview, posted before the edit.a later writerNational Park Service, Glacier Point Hotel: National Park Service, “There may have never been a better balcony view than the one from the Glacier Point Hotel”, Historic Ashes series, nps.gov, undated.his own accountRiverside talk, web text: “Dobson on Dobsonians”, transcript of his 1983 Riverside talk, sidewalkastronomers.us.his own accountPlanetary Radio 2012: Planetary Radio, Mat Kaplan, “A Conversation With Telescope Inventor John Dobson”, recorded 4 August 2012, broadcast 10 September 2012 (recording).

5. Riverside. Rhodes worked out the first visit, April 1970, from the conference’s write-ups, and the group’s 1974 report says it had missed only the first conference. The conference archive, as he cites it, has the group from 1971, with a 24-inch: the first year it lists, not the first visit. Dobson remembered an invitation in 1969. The 1971 award is Bartels’s, supported by a 1973 editor’s note that the 24-inch had won Best Optics at Riverside several years before; Wikipedia has it sharing first prize in 1969. Bartels gives the senior editor no name and no year.5757.Rhodes memoir; Idyllwild report 1974; Crater Lake interview, edited; Bartels, mirrors; Dobson 1973, p. 11; Wikipedia; Bartels 2014.someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.record from the timeIdyllwild report 1974: “Second Trip to Idyllwild”, Sidewalk Astronomers trip report on the Riverside Telescope Makers Conference, May 1974 (year inferred), sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).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 writerBartels, mirrors: Mel Bartels, “How good were John Dobson’s mirrors?”, bbastrodesigns.com, undated.his own accountDobson 1973: John Dobson, “A Simple Design for Building Large Reflectors”, Celestial Observer 4:3, July-September 1973, p. 11.a later writerWikipedia: “John Dobson (amateur astronomer)”, Wikipedia (revision of 2026).a later writerBartels 2014: Mel Bartels, “Remembering John Dobson”, bbastrodesigns.com, January 2014.

6. Federer’s letter and the mirrors. Bob King dates the letter to the summer of 1969 and quotes one sentence. Bartels quotes the same sentence in slightly different words, and a second one, with no date. Levy gives the year and what Federer doubted. The methods are described from Dobson’s own article of 1973. Bartels saw the 24-inch at Crater Lake in 1981, so his word on the mirrors is a later witness’s.5858.King 2014; Bartels 2014; Levy 1995; Dobson 1973, p. 11; Bartels, mirrors.a later writerKing 2014: Bob King, “John Dobson, Inventor of the Popular Dobsonian Telescope, Dead at 98”, Universe Today, 16 January 2014.a later writerBartels 2014: Mel Bartels, “Remembering John Dobson”, bbastrodesigns.com, January 2014.someone who was thereLevy 1995: David H. Levy, “Walden of the Sky”, Sky & Telescope, September 1995, p. 84.his own accountDobson 1973: John Dobson, “A Simple Design for Building Large Reflectors”, Celestial Observer 4:3, July-September 1973, p. 11.a later writerBartels, mirrors: Mel Bartels, “How good were John Dobson’s mirrors?”, bbastrodesigns.com, undated.

7. The Grand Canyon, the bus and the ranger. The group’s 1976 report puts it at the canyon in 1974 and 1976; in Dobson’s later tellings the visits begin about 1978. Seats on the bus were still on offer for September 1978. Levy wrote that it died in 1978 on the way home from the canyon; in June 1980 Richard Berry saw it at Rhodes’s house, with an RV about to replace it. Moser in 1989 and Dobson in 2004 tell the ranger’s remark with no park; the Wall Street Journal in 2004 and the New York Times obituary set it at Yellowstone, where by his own account the group never got in.5959.Summer Tour 1976; Crater Lake interview, edited; Noe Valley Voice 1977; Noe Valley Voice 1978; Levy 1995; Telescope Making 1980; Moser 1989, pp. 102-110; Campbell 2004; NYT obituary 2014; Crater Lake interview, transcript.record from the timeSummer Tour 1976: “Summer Tour 1976”, Sidewalk Astronomers trip report in two parts (New Oraibi, the Grand Canyon, Yosemite), sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).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).record from the timeNoe Valley Voice 1977: “Eyeing the Eclipse”, Noe Valley Voice, October 1977.record from the timeNoe Valley Voice 1978: “Star Parties”, Noe Valley Voice, April 1978.someone who was thereLevy 1995: David H. Levy, “Walden of the Sky”, Sky & Telescope, September 1995, p. 84.someone who was thereTelescope Making 1980: Richard Berry, “Riverside 1980”, and letters, Telescope Making no. 8, Summer 1980.his own accountMoser 1989: Don Moser, “John Dobson, the celestial Pied Piper”, Smithsonian, April 1989, pp. 102-110.a later writerCampbell 2004: Brett Campbell, “The Father of Street-Corner Stargazing”, Wall Street Journal, 1 September 2004, p. D10.a later writerNYT obituary 2014: Douglas Martin, obituary of John Dobson, New York Times News Service, January 2014.his own accountCrater Lake interview, transcript: F. Owen Hoffman’s own transcript of the same 31 July 2004 interview, posted before the edit.

8. Smaller points. The Death Valley report is dated only by its copyright line, 1973. 1600 Baker Street is in print as his address in 1971 and as the group’s in 1983. Rhodes says he went to work full time in 1977 but counts his years of helping from 1968 to 1974; he does not say what changed in 1974, or when another man took over hauling the 24-inch. His book Astronomy for Children Under Eighty has a copyright date of 1 November 1973. A notice of August 1974 announced a Bruce Blair Award for him; we have found no report of the presentation.6060.Death Valley report 1973; Oakland Tribune, 29 Sep 1971; Telescope Making 1983, p. 46; Rhodes memoir; Copyright catalog 1974; South Pasadena Review 1974.his own accountDeath Valley report 1973: John Dobson, “Dying Stars Viewed From Death Valley”, trip report (copyright 1973), quanta-gaia.org.record from the timeOakland Tribune, 29 Sep 1971: “Star Watchers to Gather at Park”, Oakland Tribune, 29 September 1971, p. 59 (California Digital Newspaper Collection).his own accountTelescope Making 1983: “Dobson on Dobsonians”, his Riverside talk of May 1983, Telescope Making no. 20, pp. 43ff.someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.record from the timeCopyright catalog 1974: Catalog of Copyright Entries, third series, vol. 28, part 1, no. 1 (Books, January to June 1974), entry A536638.record from the timeSouth Pasadena Review 1974: “Amateur Astronomers Set Meeting”, South Pasadena Review, 5 August 1974, p. 8 (California Digital Newspaper Collection).

9. Transcripts, scans and what we have not seen. His 2008 talk, the radio interviews of 1991 and 2012, a class of 1994-95 and two short films are paraphrased from transcripts, not yet checked by ear. Quotations from newspapers, magazines and the club’s copies of his 1983 talk and the 1976 trip report come from machine-read scans or reprints, still to be compared with the printed page. Not seen: the 1968 Chronicle story, Federer’s letter, the Riverside write-ups, the group’s newsletters and the Grand Canyon newspaper of June 1976.6161.PATS talk 2008, at 00:17:34; Planetary Radio 2012, at 00:11:47; Fresh Air 1991, at 00:09:21; Cosmology class 6, at 00:03:58; The Night Sky, at 00:04:09; The Telescope Man, at 00:01:10; Contra Costa Times 1969; Telescope Making 1983, p. 45; Levy 1995; Riverside talk, web text; Summer Tour 1976; Perlman 2000; King 2014; Rhodes memoir.his own accountPATS talk 2008: John Dobson, “Einstein’s Geometry”, talk at the Pacific Astronomy and Telescope Show, 14 September 2008 (recording).his own accountPlanetary Radio 2012: Planetary Radio, Mat Kaplan, “A Conversation With Telescope Inventor John Dobson”, recorded 4 August 2012, broadcast 10 September 2012 (recording).his own accountFresh Air 1991: Fresh Air, Terry Gross, “Sidewalk Astronomer John Dobson”, NPR, 1 May 1991 (recording).his own accountCosmology class 6: John Dobson, cosmology class 6, audio recording, about 1994 (recording).his own accountThe Night Sky: The Night Sky, episode 4, “Conversation with John Dobson”, JPL Public Education Office, 1990s (recording).his own accountThe Telescope Man: “JD: The Telescope Man”, documentary short, undated (recording).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 accountTelescope Making 1983: “Dobson on Dobsonians”, his Riverside talk of May 1983, Telescope Making no. 20, pp. 43ff.someone who was thereLevy 1995: David H. Levy, “Walden of the Sky”, Sky & Telescope, September 1995, p. 84.his own accountRiverside talk, web text: “Dobson on Dobsonians”, transcript of his 1983 Riverside talk, sidewalkastronomers.us.record from the timeSummer Tour 1976: “Summer Tour 1976”, Sidewalk Astronomers trip report in two parts (New Oraibi, the Grand Canyon, Yosemite), sidewalkastronomers.us (archived copy).a later writerPerlman 2000: David Perlman, “A Star Among Astronomers”, San Francisco Chronicle, about December 2000 (reprinted on sidewalkastronomers.us).a later writerKing 2014: Bob King, “John Dobson, Inventor of the Popular Dobsonian Telescope, Dead at 98”, Universe Today, 16 January 2014.someone who was thereRhodes memoir: Brian Rhodes, “John Dobson and Delphinium”, memoir of 1968 to 1979, sidewalkastronomers.us.