As many of us do, I still hold out hope (
dream) of having a permanent observatory. The rewards are worth it, and each experience (mostly) exhilarating, but the drive two hours to a darker site and babysitting the rig all night can
get old . And then there's the drive home ....
This may be the only existing picture of my (never finished) backyard observatory built many years ago. That's me sitting with my mother in May of 1975. I had a lot more hair
back then ....
I started it at age 14 in 1973 — a 48" square slab upon which I dragged my 8" f/8 reflector out of the garage to view and image. About a year later, I had the bright idea to enclose it. So I dug out and poured a 10' footing around the slab, and then screwed in 2x6" cleats. A lot of creosote. My dad ran a 120V line underground and connected an outdoor outlet that would be inside and I scribed in a 3/4" exterior plywood floor level with the slab. It was one of my mother's brothers who had the cinder blocks delivered to the house, and I became quite the bad mason ....
Sometime after I went off to college in 1976, my brother knocked the structure down. He has owned the house since the '80s. We live a mile-and-a-half away under (now) Bortle 6 skies.
Such is the short story of my short-lived long ago observatory.
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