[Crater101 (Warren)]

...when cleaning up.

I should preface this post by saying that the attached image is not my creation. Since I didn't capture it, I've put it in general chat. Mods, please move if necessary.

I was tidying up in the garage today and came across and old cardboard box full of science magazines from the past. One of them was OMEGA, an Australian science digest magazine that ran from the early to late 80's. The attached image was part of a fold-out feature starting on page 84 of this issue - the November/December 1981 issue - titled We're Reaching For The Stars, by Cheryl Clayton.

One of the little things the article stated was
"How do career astronomers hope to learn the secrets of all the multitudes of stars in the sky? The answer: only with the help of countless enthusiastic, knowledgeable amateurs."

The image, titled M42: the Great Nebula in Orion had the following on it.

"The photographer was R. Milne using a 20cm Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope, taking a 20 minute exposure at f10 on Ektachrome 400 chilled to -76 degrees C and pushed to 800 ASA."

I don't know who R. Milne is, but remember this was done on FILM over 40 years ago without the benefit of digital enhancement. We've come a long way in this hobby - but let's not forget that there were people pushing it forward long ago. If anyone knows the photographer / astronomer, let them know that their work hasn't been forgotten!


EDIT: The image was scanned by me on a document scanner at 300dpi. It's not a photo quality scanner, so that may account for some of the grain in the image.