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Revive the Almanack Tradition

Wed, 06 May 2026 18:04:48 GMT

Let's revive the Almanack Tradition, an essential feature of life in Early America

Today, an "almanac" is usually a collection of interesting but useless information, a compendium of listings of national capital cities or World Series winners. But in centuries past an astronomical "almanack" (note the spelling) was an essential feature of American life, so that the Olde Farmers could find their times of planting and harvest.

The Almanack Tradition represents a traditional source of “Americana.” The Cambridge Almanack was the earliest English-language publication in the New World, first published in A.D. 1639 (before the Bay Psalm Book in 1640).

The original Colonial Almanacks featured calendar pages which include:

* Times of sunrise and sunset (for planting and harvest)

* Moon phases, risings, settings and transits

* Transits of conspicuous objects (for finding time of day)

* Planetary conjunctions (for finding date of year)

* Religious feast days (especially moveable feasts like Easter (i.e., Pascha))

* Times of high and low tides

* Other memorable dates

The Colonial Almanacks also included:

* Weather forecasts

* Farming and gardening tips

* Recipes and herbal medicine

* Poetry, folklore, humor, articles and general miscellany.

(Traditional almanacks, then and now, include a couple pages of astrology, which represents traditional superstition, debunked by modern science and should be ignored).

To my knowledge, there are still four extant Early American almanacks still in publication to this very day. Some are available at your local drug store or supermarket. Some are available in regional areas and others are nationally available. Each have a website from which they can be ordered. Click the images below to surf over to their websites for ordering and other information.

(Please let me know if you are aware of any other extant almanacks still in publication.)

Please support these almanacks and use them to find the times of sunrise and sunset, the Moon's phases, and the occurrences of the celestial bodies useful for natural methods of timekeeping and navigation by the Sun, Moon, stars and planets.

Create a Backyard Compass

Wed, 06 May 2026 16:37:47 GMT

The ORIGINAL Classical Astronomy Backyard Compass! Often Imitated, Never Duplicated!

These are the instructions for the ORIGINAL Classical Astronomy Backyard Compass, first published in our Signs & Seasons curriculum in 2007 and in the companion Field Journal in 2008. The Backyard Compass has proven to be a very useful and popular activity... so much so that it has been bootlegged by many (who didn't even bother to give it their own name!) A Backyard Compass is an indispensible tool for learning the cycles of the Sun, Moon, stars and planets, especially for the purpose of natural timekeeping and navigation from these celestial bodies. Let's get started!

Create a Backyard Compass

Necessary materials:

Some sticks, a tape measure, and five paving stones from a garden supply center.

This is a very important project that will be used throughout the field activities. You will make a compass that is big enough to stand on, as shown in the book. This will help you find direction
and learn to orient yourself as you learn the constellations and signs of the seasons.

The first thing you need to do is find “high noon,” when the Sun is highest in the sky and the shadows are the shortest. As Pliny the Elder instructed in A.D. 50:

After observing the quarter in which the Sun rises on any given day, at the sixth hour of the day (i.e. at Noon) take your position in such a manner as to have the point of the Sun’s rising on your left; you will then have the south directly facing you, and the north at your back: a line drawn through a field in this direction is called the “cardinal” line... It will be the sixth hour of the day, at the moment when the shadow straight before him is the shortest. Through the middle of this shadow, taken lengthwise, a furrow must be traced in the ground with a hoe, or else a line drawn with ashes, some twenty feet in length.

So here’s what to do:
* Pick a site in your backyard away from the house and other buildings, with a wide open view in as many directions as possible. (Get your parent’s permission before beginning!)

* Place a stick in the ground about one foot long. Be sure the stick is placed very straight in the ground.

* On a sunny day, observe the shadows from between about 11:00 AM and 2:00 PM (since high noon can occur at very different times depending on the season and your location.)

* Every 20-30 minutes, place a short twig into the ground at the end of the stick’s shadow.

* After the time is up, use a ruler or tape measure to find the distance between each twig and the stick. The shortest distance is your cardinal line that runs from north to south!

* Carefully extend your cardinal 1ine 10 feet (3 meters) to the north and to the south from your stick. Place paving stones at each point. These are the north and south points of your compass.

* Remove the stick and place a paving stone in its place. This is your central standing stone.

* From your standing stone, measure a line perpendicular to your cardinal line, another 10 feet (3 meters) on either side. Check carefully to make sure your lines are even. Place paving stones at these ends. These are the east and west points of your compass.

* Recheck your compass over the next two or three days to make sure that the shadows really are shortest in the direction of your cardinal line.

* (OPTIONAL -- Add four more marker stones between the cardinal stones to indicate NE, NW, SE and SW.)

* When your compass is accurate, you can now stand on your standing stone and look at each direction of the compass, day or night and when it’s cloudy!

* You can write the names of the directions on your compass points -- N-E-W-S – help every member of the family find the compass points. Also, you can dig out under your stones to set them in the earth, to make sure the lawn mower won’t hit them.

* If space does not permit, you can create a temporary backyard compass on a driveway or other pavement surface using sidewalk chalk.

For many activities and to learn the cycles of the Sun, Moon, stars and planets, order your copies of Signs & Seasons and the Field Journal .

Make this the year your family studies astronomy!

Please drop us an email to let us know how your Backyard Compass turned out, or if you have any questions! Thanks, jay

The Sunshine Movement

Tue, 22 Jul 2025 13:36:18 GMT

We all need a little sunshine in our day

I've lately been struck by the degree of fakeness in modern American life. Nothing new about it, I've just made a lot of observations recently that have driven home the point. It's like the scales have fallen from my eyes, how fake everything now seems. We live our lives in a bubble of fakeness, spend all our days in fake indoor environments, eating fake food loaded with fake ingredients, driving fake cars down fake roads, having fake interactions and experiences over our phones. You all know what I mean.

I heard something recently, or maybe I read it.... The human psyche responds well to observing the fractal geometry of nature, the orderly randomness of natural objects -- the radiating, sudividing structure of tree branches, rivers and tributaries, convective cells in clouds, etc., also reflected in the alvioli within our lungs and the branching of veins and arteries of our circulatory system. Observing natural fractal structures has a calming, relaxing effect. But the human psyche does NOT respond well to observing the straight lines and sharp angles in the Euclidean geometry of artificial, man-made objects -- buildings and roads and all the box-shaped structures in strip malls and other constructs of the urban landscape. Observing such shapes induces stress in the human brain, which might help account for the current state of American life, especially in the citiies.

Anyway, in view of all the above and more, I just want to encourage everyone to join me in the Sunshine Movement.

It's very simple -- just take a step back from the pervasive fakeness of American life and seek out things that are geniune. Take some baby steps, make some simple resolutions. And encourage a friend or loved one to do the same. Here's a short, incomplete list of ideas:

I'm gonna go outside and get some sunshine today;
I'm gonna eat some healthy food today;
I'm gonna take a walk today;
I'm gonna spend less time on my phone today;
I'm gonna start a new book today -- a real, paper book;
I'm gonna learn something new today;
I'm gonna notice something in nature today;
I'm gonna say hi to someone today;
But especially, I'm gonna go outside and get some sunshine today.

FAQ -- What Kind of Telescope Should I Buy?

Sat, 01 Mar 2025 18:34:11 GMT

Before You Buy A Telescope

Astronomy is the oldest science, and was around at the dawn of recorded history. According to Josephus, the science of the stars was first developed by the children of Seth, the son of Adam! So the sky has been studied for thousands of years. But the telescope was invented only 400 years ago, and is a relatively recent addition to this ancient science.

Unfortunately, in our generation, the media and the schools center all astronomy education around the telescope. So one gets the impression that a telescope is indispensible for learning the stars. But one might wonder, what did astronomers do for all those millennia before the telescope was invented? This is the primary focus of the Classical Astronomy Update, to teach about the forgotten tradition of observing the sky without the requirement of a telescope.

But a telescope can be useful piece of astronomy equipment, as long as the person is adequately prepared. Too many people make the mistake of rushing out to buy a scope before they are prepared, with lots of enthusiasm and high expectations. But after a few unfruitful nights under the stars, the unprepared observer can become very disappointed and disillusioned.

To save everyone a lot of trouble and expense, I always recommend that a person obtain a bit of experience with astronomy before buying a scope. Here are some points to consider before you buy a telescope.

Learn the Sky

Perhaps the biggest problem with new scope owners is they rush out and buy scope, but then can’t find anything! They’re able to point the scope at the Moon, and not much else. They believe they can find something in the sky by pointing the scope at random. But this really doesn’t work, as they soon find out. So they look at the Moon a few times, and after that becomes a bore, the scope disappears into the closet forever. I’ve seen it happen a zillion times.

So in my opinion, you should not invest money into a telescope until you first learn a couple of constellations. The constellations are your “road map to the sky.” Without the constellations, you won’t be able to find anything since you won’t know where in the sky to point your scope. But scope ownership can work out if one realizes that work is required to learn the constellations. Too many people in our generation expect it to be easy, and fold up right away if time and effort are required to learn the sky.

Winter is an excellent time to being learning the sky, since Orion is visible in the early evening. There is a beautiful, bright nebula in the “Sword” of Orion that is easy to find with a modest scope. So if you are at least committed to learning the constellations, you can spot a good number of celestial sights on a “learn as you go” basis.

So be patient, learn the sky and, until the appropriate time, save yourself a few bucks. You might want to read Sky & Telescope magazine. That’s how I first learned the sky. They have articles, sky maps and sky-watching tips. You can find it on newsstands or any library.

Have Realistic Expectations

We’ve all seen splashy astro-photographs of brightly colored nebulae and galaxies. The Hubble Space Telescope has filled our televisions, magazines and computer monitors with brightly glowing cosmic vistas. From these photos, you would get the impression that the universe is a bright, swirling place. And you then expect to see such sights through the eyepiece of your scope. But if so, you would be wrong! Like I always tell people, if the views through a telescope were all that interesting or exciting, we’d all hear about it, and since they’re not, we don’t.

There are basically three telescope targets that I consider worthwhile — the Moon, Jupiter and Saturn. These sights are always impressive, even through smaller scopes. It can be fun to learn the names of lunar craters, or follow the cycles of Jupiter’s Moons. Over a span of years, you can watch the changes in the orientation of Saturn’s rings. The other planets are either too small or featureless to be interesting targets. And even the better targets can look “smallish” through a small scope at low magnification.

Galaxies and nebulae are known as “deep sky objects” and can be visible through smaller scopes. However, these objects are only visible as faint “fuzzy patches,” little puffs of celestial smoke. Even under excellent conditions, these objects do not in any way resemble the colorful, time-lapse observatory photos that we see in magazines. Also, you must be under a very dark sky far from the city to see these wisps at all. Most people (like me) aren’t much impressed with such sights. It’s definitely an “acquired taste” for many people! So be sure to adjust your expectations and not expect mind-blowing sights through the eyepiece.

Look Through Someone Else’s Scope

Considering the above, do yourself a favor and invest some time at someone else’s eyepiece before you decide to plop down a few hundred bucks for your own scope. I’d recommend finding a local astronomy club in your area and pay them a visit. Most clubs have public telescope viewing nights all year round, and many clubs work through planetariums or observatories. Your family can get a look through a scope and also learn a bit about the sky.

These astronomy clubs all have a least a few veteran amateur astronomers who are very knowledgeable about the sky and would love to help your family learn. You can get a lot of information about the sky and advice about telescope buying, etc. Who knows, you might get hooked! A list of astronomy clubs, planetariums and observatories is found in the “Resources” section at the Sky & Telescope web site .

An Alternative to Scope Ownership

Before you buy a scope, I’d recommend you start out with a decent pair of binoculars. You should still be able to get a pair of Bushnell 50mm binocs for about $40-50. You can do a lot of sky exploring with some cheap $40 binoculars, even from a light polluted area in the city. Just lay back on the grass and you’d be amazed what you can see. Binocs are also useful during the daytime for bird-watching and looking at other distance objects on the ground.

There are a number of books available about binocular astronomy and what you can see in the sky in the binocular 7-10 times magnification range. I recommend Gary Seronik’s Binocular Highlights from Sky & Telescope, available at Amazon and other online booksellers. If you like looking at the sky through binocs, it will be excellent preparation for using a scope at a later time.

If You MUST Buy a Scope

If your family must buy a scope right away, make sure you don’t buy one from any “big box” retail stores, like stores that have “Mart” in the name. These scopes are just toys and will disappoint everytime. A quality optical instrument is going to set you back several hundred bucks. So if the big box stores are selling pricey scopes, make sure they are a good brand name, such as Meade or Celestron. You would probably do better if you buy a scope from a camera shop or other dealer that specializes in optical products.

Telescope selection in general is based on need. A scope suitable for high-power planet watching isn’t so good for low-power galaxies and nebulae. Being a traditionalist, I consider a good starter scope to be a six-inch f/8 Newtonian reflecting telescope. They tend to be small (only about 4 feet long!) and cheap (only a few hundred dollars!).

A good vendor is Orion Telescopes , where you can also find a selection of other type scopes. You also might want to look on the web at Astromart and places like that for a used scope. But as with all used item purchases — “caveat emptor” — let the buyer beware! The real question is not “what’s a good scope,” but “how much money d’ya got?”

A lot of people recommend these little computer-driven Meade ETX scopes. The ETX is supposed to be a good, inexpensive ($300) starter scope. Such scopes include a computer driven “go to” feature that locates objects in the sky and points the telescope in the proper direction. This “go to” feature assists newbies in finding celestial objects, and are supposed to help the viewer minimize the time and effort of finding objects.

But I am “old school” in that I believe that knowing the sky is most of the fun of observing. So in my opinion, you lose a lot if your scope does all the heavy lifting. Also, I’ve heard these “go to” systems are not perfect, and total novice can still encounter problems with finding objects if the scope is not properly set up and calibrated. But I’ve never looked through the eyepiece of an ETX so I can’t comment based on experience.

I’m not one to ask about commercial scopes since I’ve only made my own telescopes. Telescope making is a great hobby in its own right, but it’s a lot of work and has a very steep learning curve. But an amateur can invest the time and care needed to make a mirror that tests out better than a “production line” mirror in a commercial scope. In my opinion, the views through a $5000 Meade are inferior to the view through my 10″ telescope with a hand-ground telescope mirror, made at home for $300 plus about 100 hours of work. Check out http://www.stellafane.org for more info on telescope making and a million links.

Maybe you will be one of those folks who are intrigued by looking at galaxies and other deep sky objects. If so, amateur astronomy is the hobby for you! But even for the loyal hobbyists, it can be a lot of work driving from the city to set up a scope in a suitably dark rural location. If you arrive at a site after dark, it can be a real hassle to set up in pitch black darkness. And then you get a stiff neck from leaning over the eyepiece!

Really, my favorite part of astronomy is just being under a dark sky with the optics God gave me! I’ve traveled hundreds of miles to amateur astronomy “star parties” and never even looked through a scope!

Anyway, sorry if these tips aren’t what some folks want to hear, but I’d rather share my unvarnished opinions and point you in the right direction. But whatever decision your family makes with respect to scope buying and ownership, please give it the proper consideration.

Some Remarks About Flat Earth-ism

Sat, 01 Mar 2025 18:23:24 GMT

Some Remarks About Flat Earth-ism

I continue to get many requests from people wanting me to debunk flat earth-ism. I really dislike this whole subject for many reasons and wish it would just go away. My work is to teach and inform, not argue and contend. I have no taste for debunking anything, but instead am passionate about sharing facts that are not commonly understood, especially all the cool stuff in the sky hiding in plain sight. And while I do believe that flat earth-ism is quieting down lately and no longer spreading like a few years ago, the "true believers" remain undeterred. Flat earth-ism reminds me of this humorous quote from President Ronald Reagan:

The trouble with our Liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so.

This is certainly true of our flat earth friends. They contend that there is no evidence that the Earth is really round but they brush aside and dismiss any evidence you try to offer. They say that there are 600 Scriptures that teach a flat earth, but when you read the verses, the picture is not so clear, and these verses do not actually teach what they are purported to teach. These verses certainly do not provide enough information to support the specifics of the flat earth model, as taught on the internet.

In the current flat earth model making the rounds nowadays, the Earth is depicted as a flat circle in a literal azimuthal projection like the United Nations map, centered on the North -ole. Somehow, the Sun and Moon float above the Earth and continuously circle overhead, moving back in forth with the seasons. Flat earth-ism teaches that, though the Sun and Moon do not actually rise and set over the horizon, the sunrises and sunsets that we observe are because light does not really move in a straight line but somehow "drops" (or something) when the Sun and Moon are a certain distance away, creating an illusion of rising and setting that perfectly fits with how things would appear if the Earth really were round with light moving in a straight line.

When you try to offer a proof that the Earth is a globe, flat earthers usually have a handy "talk-around" to explain it away, whether it be time zones, eclipses, horizon dip, or the coriolis effect. Usually these "talk arounds" do not offer a complete explanation and reveal an inadequate understanding of the topics. The contemporary flat earth internet craze is an extension of the "Apollo hoax," that the spherical Earth is just a NASA conspiracy theory to deceive the public for some reason, failing to grasp how the spherical globe has been known for millennia.

Flat earth-ism begins in an honest place. In our culture and the educational establishment, the sphericity of the Earth is handed down on authority in classrooms and in textbooks. Teachers and science promoters never offer proofs or explanations of the Earth's sphericity. One is expected to just swallow the roundness of the Earth as a given fact, sight unseen, and accept that it is true because the "almighty" science establishment says so. We, the unwashed herd, are expected to just shut our stupid mouths and "trust the science" and defer to the superior wisdom of our "betters" in the white lab coats because they are so much smarter than us, just as they also expect us to believe every other aspects of mainstream science handed down on authority with no validation, including darwinism and the covid orthodoxy of 2020.

The fact is, people are entitled to explanations as to why modern science understands the Earth to be a globe. People have a right to be distrustful when no explanations are forthcoming. I have long been critical of this status quo, and regret that I still have not had the opportunity to write the books that would provide the proofs that the Earth is a globe in orbit around the Sun. These proofs are really cool but rather deep, and you really need to spend quality time studying the sky to appreciate them, which hardly no one does today. Nonetheless, everyone living in the modern world should take the time to understand these things, even though there is a dearth of good material on the subject. So I'm sympathetic in principle to flat earthers. However, I am not sympathetic towards anyone whose mind is closed and who rejects outright any attempt to offer legitimate explanations. It's a really cool story how we know today that the Earth one of the round planets in our solar system, third from the Sun.

If you have a flat earth friend or family member, I'd encourage you to just ask them a lot of questions....

Did you always believe the Earth was flat?
If not, what did you learn that persuaded you?
What was the source of this information?
Did you see these slick computer graphic videos on the web?
What is the source of these videos? Who produced them?
CGI does not create itself so who paid for these slick videos?
Are you aware that there is propaganda on the web sponsored by enemies of the USA, with the intent of deceiving the American populace?
Shouldn't that make you skeptical of unsourced information posted on the web?
Have you made an effort to be objective and seek out explanations as to why science teaches that the Earth is spherical?
Have you noticed legit educational organizations always identify themselves?
Have you noticed that they usually have websites, sell products and/or solicit donations?
What flat earth organizations do you belong to and how are they funded?

In any event, the sphericity of the Earth has been known since the Ancient Greeks, centuries before Christ. The principles of Euclid's geometry were applied to the sky to predict the extreme seasonal daylight at the poles and the reversal of seasons in the southern hemisphere, millennia before these places were visited by explorers.

These facts have been widely accepted by almost all Christians across the world over the last 2000 years. The sphericity of the Earth has never been a serious controversy in the Christian church, and has never been a test of Biblical or doctrinal orthodoxy. Down through the centuries, flat earth-ism was only taught by a small number of individual Christians in certain localized places.

As explained in Inventing The Flat Earth: Columbus and Modern Historians by Jeffrey Burton Russell , an "urban legend" arose in the 19th century propagated by secular historians that Medieval Christians believed that the Earth was flat. This notion is now debunked by solid evidence. It is acknowledged in modern scholarship today that Christians in Medieval times (and also before and after) understood and accepted the classic proofs of the Ancient Greeks of the sphericity of the Earth.

"Belief" in a flat or round Earth is not an option. If we believe that we live in the real world of objective reality, the subject is not open for debate or differing opinions. Either the Earth is round or it is not, for reasons that we should be able to observe and confirm.

Our entire edifice of modern science is built upon the physics of Isaac Newton, who established heliocentrism as the central premise of how things work in the cosmos. Newton himself was a devoted Christian who wrote more Bible commentaries than scientific works. Newton's physics offered mathematically precise results, from the movements of bodies on the Earth to the celestial bodies in space, all following the same set of scientific laws. Newton's physics is the basis of all modern science today. If you could somehow remove heliocentrism and the spherical Earth, all science would collapse like a Jenga game. It is most ironic that the popular contemporary deception of flat earth-ism is propagated using 21st century technology via smart phones and the internet. It's rather sad that science education is in such a sorry state that some have uncritically adopted and internalized this debunked urban legend without seeking the facts.

Partial Lunar Eclipse Over Cleveland

Mon, 02 Sep 2024 19:33:57 GMT

The Next Eclipse Season after the Total Solar Eclipse

Here in Cleveland we're very excited for the pennant race with our Cleveland Guardians (nee' the Cleveland Indians). The team has been in first place in the American League Central for most of the season, which started with the Eclipse Over Cleveland back on April 8.

To commemorate this winning season, there will be a partial lunar eclipse on the evening of Tuesday, September 17!

Eclipses always occur in pairs. This is an eclipse season in which a solar eclipse always occurs within two weeks of a lunar eclipse. There are always at least two eclipse seasons in every calendar year, separated by 6 lunar months. However, not all of these eclipses are visible everywhere in the world so you don't get a clear sense of the eclipse seasons unless you follow them closely.

The September 17 lunar eclipse will be partial since the Moon will not fully align with the umbra or full shadow of the Earth. At maximum eclipse, the edge of the Moon will only graze the umbra, resulting in a very brief and shallow partial phase.

As always, the partial phase will be preceded by a penumbral phase, where the Moon passes through the penumbra , or partial shadow of the Earth. During this period, there will be a degree of shading upon the Moon. The penumbral phase is not the same for every eclipse. Sometimes it's a lot of shading, sometimes not much. But for most lunar eclipses there's not a whole lot to see during the penumbral phase.

The penumbral phase begins at 8:39 PM Eastern Daylight Time (EDT)on September 17. This is P1, when the limb of the Moon makes first contact with the penumbra. The show gets better at U1, first contact with the Earth's umbra, at 10:11 PM EDT. The partial phase is best at MID eclipse, 10:44 PM. The partial phase ends at U4, 11:16 PM EDT, followed by an egressing penumbral phase until after midnight, 12:49 AM.

This lunar eclipse will be best visible to Americans east of the Mississippi as it will be fairly high in the sky, though later at night. In the Rocky Mountain longitudes the Moon will rise during the penumbral phase following P1 -- not high in the sky but visible earlier in the evening, local time. Over the west coast the Moon will rise in the midst of the partial phase, between U1 and U4, which would be an intersting sight if viewed coming up over the Pacific Ocean.

That evening will be the second game in a 4-game homestand against division rival, the Minnesota Twins. This game will no doubt be hotly contested! The partial phase will begin long after the 6:30 games ends (hopefully not long extra innings!) It should be a great celestial celebration of this exciting Guardians season!

Even though this partial eclipse is rather feeble, it's still an Eclipse Over Cleveland! I'm hopeful that these two eclipses will bookend a championship baseball season here on the usually ice-entrusted shores of Lake Erie.

How to See the Blaze Star in 2024

Sun, 23 Jun 2024 22:00:43 GMT

T Coronae Borealis will become visible this summer.

Have you been hearing about "The Blaze Star" that is predicted to erupt in the evening sky in the Summer of 2024? It's not that big a deal, don't fall for the hype. But it might be a worthwhile sight if you can take the time to learn a few constellations.

You can all read about it in our recent newsletter .

Click this link for our newsletter archive and to subscribe . Don't miss a single edition of the Classical Astronomy Update email newsletter! And tell all your friends!