Did you know that in 1900 Carleton astronomers packed up one of the college’s massive telescopes and put it on a train bound for North Carolina? Determined to see the May 28, 1900 solar eclipse, they set up camp near the town of Southern Pines, ate a proper lunch (after all, head of school Professor H.C. Wilson was there), and observed the eclipse.
I had no idea what I was getting into when my boss, Bruce Duffy, told me that I was going to spend the next few weeks moving the old Goodsell Observatory website into Reason — Carleton’s modern website content management system. What I uncovered was a wealth of knowledge and hard work to which I am glad to have been exposed. I hope that my work on this new website has made the content housed here a little more accessible to the world.
Several months after I started, I have come away with a much more complete sense of the importance of the observatory and the significance of both present and past work at Goodsell. I encourage you to explore this website — from M2 to R2D2, there’s a lot going on here!
Ben Levy ’15
May 6th, 2013
This website’s content has been written over the past decades by many people. I would especially like to acknowledge the hard work of Nathaneal Motz who created and wrote much of the original site. I also want to thank Joel Weisberg, Cindy Blaha, Bruce Duffy, and Andrew Peterson, all of whom have been instrumental in making this transition happen.