The Neville Public Museum Astronomical Society
Exploring the universe, one object at a time!

The History of the NPMAS

George McCourt and I are currently working with Ron Parmenter in an effort to document the history of the NPMAS. As a result, this page will be growing and changing in the near future. As a little teaser, I found an article written by Ron in the December 1988 issue of the club newsletter, The Eyepiece. I have retyped here for your enjoyment.

 

Club History by Ron Parmentier

A history of the club has never been done and the records are somewhat sketchy in those first years. But I have been with the club from day one and would be the only one who can fill in the gaps.

My records go back to May 1966 with a list of 22 members. The president at that time was Terry Quigley, the brother of Donn Quigley who was and is on the Neville Museum Staff. Donn offered the use of the museum as a central meeting place and in the eyes of those first members a very suitable arrangement. We were required to have one public observing night a year and open the meetings to the public.

If I remember right, Hugh Swoboda, an amateur astronomer, observer and mirror maker, approached a few of us who had been observers and friends, with the idea of starting a club to share our interest. There were clubs in Milwaukee and Madison and others in the Fox Valley but none for those of us in Green Bay. We made it known that the club was forming and that there would be a meeting at the museum. We had a very good first turnout of about 50 people. From them we set up the club with a constitution and the like. After a while we got down to a core group of about 22 members. A program committee was set up and this was our first program which usually was set up to run from May to May. The program committee consisted of Joan Phenicie, Earl Brooks, Gary Kuester and Hal Hudson. There were a total of 12 meetings and 12 field sessions.

The topics were as follows:
1. Constellations (1 meeting)
2. Locating objects, stars, magnitude (1 meeting)
3. A study of the tools of the astronomer (1 meeting)
4. Techniques of observation (1 meeting and 1 field session)
5. The solar system - general (1 meeting and one field session)
6. The galactic system - general (1 meeting and one field session)
7. The laws of light and optics (1 meeting)
8. Telescope making, mirror grinding (2 meetings and 2 field sessions)
9. UFO's and other phenomena (1 meeting)
10. Comets (1 meeting)
11. Photography (1 meeting)
12. Two field trips to observatories or planetariums
13. Three field sessions as interest dictates

All topics were given by members of the club according to what they felt they could talk on. We rotated as much as possible to give everyone a chance to speak before the group. We had telescopes as large as 10". In fact, I now have that telescope (vintage circa 1940) made by Carl Elias, a maker of over 40 telescopes, who lived in Appleton at the time and was one of my mentors who was very influential in always keeping my interest alive.

Hal Hudson became the 2nd president of the club from May 1967 to May 1968. It is at this time I find Allen Collins signed up as a member. He is still a member and the only other one from the old days still with us. I know some of the other earthly members are still living in the area but have since gone into other pursuits. The membership of 1969 has me down as the president and I've been the president ever since! I wonder how that happened! Anyway, attendance was low at some of the early meetings as we went through the necessary growing pains. We changed to NASA films at the meetings as we exhausted our member topics. We watched 16mm films on Tycho Brahe, The Clouds of Venus, Apollo 8,9 and 10, Star Gazing, The Solar System - The Giant Planets, and the like in 1969.

In 1970 we had a program entitled "The Building of the 20" Telescope". I had realized one of my dreams and was the largest telescope mirror I had made.

In 1969 Karvin Leffel became a member and is still with us. Karvin was a teaching assistant in 1975 at UWGB writing a first-level college astronomy text with professor Anjoni Mehra.

Jim Sentowski was listed as a member in 1971 and was with us for quite some time and then was gone for a few years and has now signed in again with his son in 1988. In 1975 according to a biographical sketch Jim was a student at UWGB assisting in astronomy classroom lectures.

The dues in the early days were $3.00 a year and in 1975 the dues were increased to $5.00. It was at this time that Richard Schneider attended our February 1975 meeting as a visitor. It is on his dad's farm that the current 30" observatory is located. Through this time we were still showing NASA films as the main program of the meetings.

George McCourt, who is the present vice-president, first show up on the membership list of 1977. He became vice-president in 1981.

There are no minutes of the meetings which exist which makes for quite a gap in what was discussed. I found one copy of a letter to the Lick observing station at Mt. Hamilton, California thanking the staff for showing George McCourt and me the facilities in 1978. In 1979 Dan Sheber joined us and has been our avid deep-sky observer.

Stan Sukowaty has been with us since 1982 and is an avid convention goer.

By October 1981 the observatory for the 20" was dedicated. The 20" was replaced with the 30" through the help of Ted Kordes and dedicated in August of 1988. Even though the observatory is not a club observatory members are welcome to be part of the observing programs and activities that may be going on at the observatory.

We changed our logo in 1984 to the present observatory design and became affiliated with the Astronomical League with myself as the ALCor designate. At this time we started to publish an events calendar. We started to become associated with other societies in Marquette, Michigan, Milwaukee, Racine, Madison and the Chicago group. Some members began to go to the regional and national conventions. We have been having public observing nights at the Wildlife Sanctuary since 1982. Formerly we had them on the grounds of the old Neville Public Museum on Jefferson Street.

Of late members have been getting high tech with digital setting circles and such things added on to the scopes. There are members observing the Sun, the deep-sky, the near sky (in association with ALPO, The Association of Lunar & Planetary Observers), and lunar occultation's to mention some. We are very much alive and are now moving ahead with this newsletter to reach out to our members. The future looks very promising for the group.

R.P.