MONKS, like thousands of other mortals, are now making their own telescopes. From the Society of the Divine Word, Techny, Illinois, comes the following:

"Even in the crowded curriculum of studies at St. Mary's Major Seminary, astronomy has its place and holds an attraction for many a student. Its study serves a definitely practical purpose, since most of the seminarians will one day labor in foreign mission fields, where astronomical knowledge will supply in many ways what these primitive countries do not-aids in regard to time in regard to nautical determinations in surveying, and in exploration, to mention but a few.

"A few years ago an observatory (Figure 1) was built at Techny, housing a 110 mm. refractor, a comet-seeker, the structure having been designed and constructed by the Brother Monks. But this telescope soon proved inadequate for the interest and enthusiasm of the star-gazers, and it was deemed advisable to construct a larger one, 8" in aperture, the work being done under the direction of Father Francis Neuhaus, S. V. D., one of the seminarians. Meanwhile, Brother Corsinus, S. V. D., an able mechanic, was busy constructing a well-balanced mounting, shown in the center. With a surprising minimum of cost, the reflector was completed, and now serves to great advantage, not only to bring more of the heavens within grasp, so to say, of the students of astronomy, but also to render celestial photography possible because of the new telescope's greater light - gathering power

"Work on a 12-1/2" mirror for a still larger telescope is now under way.

AMATEUR telescopticians, ten or twenty thousands of them, have now felt their way into about all the related arteries and capillaries of optics and astronomy. One such ramification is sundialing, and under sundialing come sun-clocks. Just what is a sun-clock?

Invented by W. E. Cooke, government astronomer of New South Wales Australia, the sun-clock was described in this magazine in August, 1928, also August, 1935, by R. W. Porter. A ring or sometimes a C-shaped portion of a ring (Figure 2), carries a lens on the sunward side, and on the other an analemma, the familiar 8shaped curve of the equation of time. By turning a thumbnut with the fingers, until the Sun's image falls exactly on the analemma, hands taken from an ordinary clock are mechanically actuated through gear trains and the standard time is read on the clock dial-direct and not by a shadow, as in a sun-dial. There is, of course, no running clock movement.

Working from the articles by Porter, cited above, Fred Ferson, 414 Reynoir Street, Biloxi, Mississippi, has made the sun-clock shown in Figure 3, and states that "careful construction and adjustment afford time within one minute, likewise the date. The base casting has four leveling screws and carries a second casting which supports in a curved slot a short, stubby, curved main standing arm. This can be slid circularly and clamped for latitude. At the end of this stubby arm is a rigid, hollow stud carrying the gear box and clock face and big, curved, rotatable fork. The fork has in its upper horn a slot in which is mounted a little lens of 8" f.l. The analemma is inscribed on a sheet brass plate bent to a radius equal to the f.l. of the lens (its radius of curvature is therefore nearly twice that of the fork- study Figure 7 if "nearly" is not at first clear) and attached to the lower horn. To find the time at any desired moment the large thumbnut extending, in Figure 3, below and to the left of the gear box is turned with the fingers, and gears with ratio 1, 2, and 24 do the rest; that is, 24 revolutions of the handwheel will rotate the minute hand 24 times, the hour hand twice, and the fork once. When the Sun's image is made to bisect the analemma curve the clock hands will automatically point to the hour and minute, also giving the date." Ferson will lend further details of construction to those seriously interested.

Even now, more than a decade after he made his first sun-clock (Figure 2), Porter still composes new variations on the original theme and then makes the clocks. Figure 4 is one of these, as set up in his door-yard at Pasadena. "It consists," he writes, "first, of a spherical Pyrex flask carrying all the optical parts and the clock face, on which is also engraved the analemma. The entire unit is encircled by a grooved equatorial ring sliding on a segment below, which is fastened to the base. The equatorial gear used was a 32-pitch rack bent to fit the groove of the equatorial ring.

"In adjusting the polar axis parallel to that of the Earth, a tubeless telescope, consisting of an eyepiece and objective, is fastened to the sphere at the poles of the encircling equatorial ring. The field of view of the eyepiece contains just the apparent orbit of Polaris about the true pole so that, by estimating the hour angle of Polaris by the stars in the Big Dipper and Cassiopeia, and using the base screws' the polar axis of the instrument can be directly fixed.

"I find that the time can be relied on well within one minute. The glass flask was resorted to in order to protect all essential parts from the birds, who seemed to feel that I had made a gadget for their special benefit. The neck of the flask and a part of the sphere were removed with a 'biscuit cutter' (simply a cylinder of sheet metal) and abrasive. The plate of the clock, having nearly twice the radius of the sphere, was spun to its required curvature. All the machining was done on a wood-working lathe and drill press in the pattern shop here at The California Institute of Technology. Figure 5 is a photograph of another spherical globe sun-clock made earlier and partly similar."

And still another! Some months after the above descriptions were received, there arrived from Porter a note (Figure 6) and the following description. "The clock to be described is about my tenth design and its performance has been so satisfactory that I have decided to call it quits and turn the information over to those who may wish to have a gadget in their gardens demonstrating an interesting problem in celestial mechanics.

"The drawing (Figure 7) is a meridian section through the instrument and for economy of space I have inserted, or superposed, the clock face in the central area but its true position is shown in Figure 8.

"A is a 12-liter Pyrex flask (Corning Glass Works-it cost $3.50), whose neck B has been removed with a biscuit cutter. The flask is remarkably spherical.

"To this sphere are attached the lens C and the brass strip D on which is pasted the analemma.

"In the space removed by the biscuit cutter is the clock dial E, carrying a minute hand. Behind the clock face is a reduction gear box operated by the thumbnut F. Only two pairs of stock, 32-pitch spur gears (Boston Gear Works, Cat. No. 1-G 159, 161, 177, 179) are necessary to make the minute hand revolve 24 times during one revolution of the sphere. This clock and the gear case are fixed rigidly to the base ring H, supported on three adjusting screws I, I, I, 120 degrees apart, and these screws rest in a circular groove cut into the plate J which, in turn, is securely fastened to the pier.

"The polar axis L of the instrument is created and maintained by the glass sphere resting in ring H and revolving around the stud M by means of a pin N engaging a slot in the sphere. To save an extra pair of gears for the hour hand, this pin N serves equally well to indicate the hour. The stud M has an inclination to ring H (horizon) equal to the latitude of the location, shown here as 40 degrees.

"In operation, by turning the thumbnut, the sphere is rotated until the Sun's image falls on (and bisects) the analemma, and standard watch time is taken directly from the clock face. A small portion of the analemma is shown at O, with the Sun's image as it would fall on the 15th of May, the portion opposite covering July and August. Should the image be made to fall on the center line at P, the clock would read apparent or sun time. But PO happens to be the equation of time, so that, by using the analemma, standard time is obtained automatically. Furthermore, any deviation of the observer's position east or west of the central line of the time zone in which he resides is corrected by resetting the minute hand. This is, of course, a constant.

"The analemma is marked off in five-day intervals, so that the day of the year is given, as well as the hour and minute. It is easily drawn from data in the nautical almanac.

"I have found that the best illumination of the Sun's image is produced by an f/80-or-90 lens. In the clock here described the focal length is 10" and the lens 1/8" in diameter.

"Adjusting is done with a small temporary telescope, as previously mentioned. By using the three adjusting screws, Polaris may be brought to the required hour angle (see Q in upper, left-hand corner). The telescope is removed (next day) and replaced by the sphere and clock unit.

"Finally, so that the instrument may be removed and taken indoors at any time and replaced without disturbing its alinement, a positioning stop R is provided, which is simply a strip screwed to J and against which the south adjusting screw rests."

The above description of a sun-clock, by Porter, is more detailed than those in the earlier, 1928 and 1935, articles referred to farther back, hence the would-be maker will not gain by hunting them up. An enlarged photostat of Figure is available, for a small sum, from the editor.

Builders of such things as sun-clocks will occasionally hear this objection: "What real, practical good or, use is the thing, when we all own watches?" To a man having that type of mind a sun-clock is no good at all, and one suggested answer is simply, "None." This should stall him, completely. To other types, however, such a thing is not only a pretty thing to own, but it visibly and tangibly demonstrates our precise knowledge of the Earth's motions in space, and thus the value is mainly intellectual.

If this nation is dragged into a war, facts stated by Carl L. Bausch, of the Bausch and Lomb Optical Co., Rochester, N.Y., in an article on "Optics and Defense" in the May-June issue of Army Ordinance (Mills Bldg., Washington D.C.), may interest readers of this department. Mr. Bausch states that "Bausch & Lomb is now making 24 types of optical glass .... The present monthly capacity is about 10,000 pounds per month .... Practically all materials now used in glass making come from domestic sources, with the exception of nitrates which come from Chile in their crude form and are purified here .... The choke point in glass making is no longer the procurement of sufficient and suitable melting pots. The bottleneck has been transferred from the manufacture of glass to the manufacture of optical parts and to the assembly and adjustment of the instruments .... We could increase output of our instrument plant five times in dollars-and-cents value of product in the first three years of an emergency .... It would be necessary to work three 8-hour shifts or, preferably, two 10- or 12-hour shifts. We would have to add 4000 more employees to our payroll .... During the recent years of depression, mechanics have not been trained as they were previously, and I think it is safe to say that the available supply of trained mechanics today is less than it was in 1917 .... Without skilled labor available, it will be necessary o to recruit younger employees into our organizations to increase production, as young workers learn a new job, much faster than mature ones .... These (the 4000 new employees) will be divided as follows: Glass plant 200; optical parts work 1000; manufacture of mechanical parts 1000; assembling and adjusting 1500; toolmakers, etc., 300."

Asked whether amateur opticians, such as read the present pages, could be used, Mr. Bausch replied: "We already have a couple men in our precision optics division who came through the amateur telescope makers' channel. We believe, everything else being equal, that a man who has had experience in making reflectors for his own use will be more valuable to us as an optician than one who has not had a try at it."

On to Rochester, you am-optical patriots-in case Uncle Sam fights!

STELLAFANE convention, Saturday, August 10. Porter coming.

The Society for Amateur Scientists (SAS) is a nonprofit research and educational organization dedicated to helping people enrich their lives by following their passion to take part in scientific adventures of all kinds.