FINDER a backyard telescope
Index

Six objects.
One suburban sky.

In the winter of 1962, Ida Harwood carried a six-inch reflector onto her back veranda and kept a list: six faint things she could find from a backyard, between the streetlight and the clothesline. The telescope below points at the same patch of sky, computed from the same seed, so her six are always where she left them. Her list is on the chart. The finding is yours.

Main eyepiece1.2° true field · 110×

Drag to slew. Turn the knob until the stars are points, not doughnuts.

The Harwood Six

Transcribed from a school exercise book, water-stained, dated July 1962. Coordinates converted from her margin sketches; her notes reproduced exactly as written. Push the telescope to a mark, then finish the hunt in the finder.

Plate I — The veranda field Az 190°–300° · Alt 5°–70° · stars to mag 5 Click a mark to push-to

The observing log

Entries are added as you log each object. Sketches are made at the eyepiece the old way — graphite, red torchlight, cold fingers.

No entries yet. The sky is patient.