Abrams Planetarium
Encyclopedia
Abrams Planetarium is the planetarium on the campus of Michigan State University.
was born on August 17, 1896 in Tekonsha, Michigan. During his youth, Abrams had many aviation related jobs in Michigan, Ohio, and New York. While in New York, he attended Curtiss Aviation School and graduated in 1916. He received his Federation Aeronautique Internationale Pilot's which was signed by Orville Wright. He joined the US Marines in 1917 and worked on taking aerial photographs of enemy activity. In 1920, he left the Marines to create his own business, ABC Airlines, later the Abrams Aerial Survey Corporation. He later founded Abrams Instrument Corporation, which specialized in designing high-tech aerial photography equipment. During World War II he designed the Abrams Model P-1 Explorer and Explorer II. After his retirement in 1961, he and his wife traveled around the world several times and visited 96 countries. Abrams died on August 16, 1990.
Another service offered by the Abrams Planetarium is called Night Sky Notes. This is a daily description of what is visible in the night sky and at what time, direction and degrees above the horizon. The Starline Podcast is a three minute podcast
describing the positions of the planets in the night sky.
The planetarium hosts monthly meetings for members of the Capitol Area Astronomy Association, a group of hobbyists.
History
The Abrams Planetarium opened in 1963, and has had an estimated one million visitors since then. As a branch of the Department of Physics and Astronomy at MSU, the Abrams Planetarium is dedicated to teaching astronomy to the public. \ The planetarium is named after Talbert "Ted" Abrams and his wife Leota. Ted was a pioneer in aerial photography and Leota made very generous donations to the university. The building was designed by Ralph Calder Associates from Detroit. Over the years, it has been renovated numerous times both inside and out; the most recent change is the addition of windows in 1995.Talbert Abrams
Talbert AbramsTalbert Abrams
Talbert "Ted" Abrams was an American photographer and aviator known as the "father of aerial photography".-Early years:...
was born on August 17, 1896 in Tekonsha, Michigan. During his youth, Abrams had many aviation related jobs in Michigan, Ohio, and New York. While in New York, he attended Curtiss Aviation School and graduated in 1916. He received his Federation Aeronautique Internationale Pilot's which was signed by Orville Wright. He joined the US Marines in 1917 and worked on taking aerial photographs of enemy activity. In 1920, he left the Marines to create his own business, ABC Airlines, later the Abrams Aerial Survey Corporation. He later founded Abrams Instrument Corporation, which specialized in designing high-tech aerial photography equipment. During World War II he designed the Abrams Model P-1 Explorer and Explorer II. After his retirement in 1961, he and his wife traveled around the world several times and visited 96 countries. Abrams died on August 16, 1990.
Areas of the Planetarium
The planetarium has three main areas: the exhibit hall, the black light gallery, and the sky theater. The main entrance opens into the exhibit hall which is 3000 square feet and has many displays including pictures, telescopes, and Earth and moon globes. It also serves as a waiting area for the shows and it has a gift shop. The black light gallery is a curved gallery featuring astronomical images painted in fluorescent paint and lit by ultraviolet lights. The sky theater is fifty feet in diameter with a fifty foot dome. The inside of the dome is made of perforated aluminum and is painted white, it serves as the projection screen. The theater holds one hundred and fifty people and each seat has a different angle of tilt so each viewer has the same view of the projection. The control console is located in the rear of the theater.Spitz Projector
When the planetarium was first opened, it was installed with a Spitz Intermediate Space Transit Planetarium projector or ISTP for short. This projector was highly advanced for its time, weighing almost 1000 pounds less than similar projectors of its time. This allowed it to move in ways most projectors could not. The Spitz projected using lights and lenses, with a star hemisphere map on each end of the projector. Each side of the projector utilizes over 4000 holes to represent the night sky and is lit with high pressure xenon gas lamps inside the arc lamps. It also contains Instrument Analogs which duplicate the motions of the five observable naked eye planets: Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. The Spitz was retired in 1993 after thirty years of use.Digistar Projector
Currently, Abrams Planetarium has an Evans and Sutherland Digistar projection system. It was installed in early 1993 and upgraded to a Digistar II in the summer of 1999. The system consists of a Sun Ultra for administrative purposes, graphics co-processing systems and many control monitors. The projector itself is the first planetarium projector based entirely on computer graphics. It has a seven inch monochrome flat screen display with a fish eye lens to magnify and focus the image on the curved ceiling. The Digistar produces a very bright image and a high resolution of 8000 by 8000 pixels. Its graphics processing computer takes numerical data and manipulates it to compensate for the domed projection surface. It can also rapidly transform shapes and perspectives to create the illusion of motion, for example, travelling through the solar system at a high velocity.Public Services
The planetarium offers a sky watching service called Sky Calendar. It has a sheet for each month and clearly illustrates the positions of the moon, the planets and zodiacal constellations. Over the years, the Sky Calendar has become one of the nation's most highly illustrated and simplest guide to sky gazing. It has over 10000 paid subscribers and has appeared in issues of Science and Children. It has received many awards and great reviews from well known astronomical publications such as: Sky & Telescope, Mercury, and Scientific American.Another service offered by the Abrams Planetarium is called Night Sky Notes. This is a daily description of what is visible in the night sky and at what time, direction and degrees above the horizon. The Starline Podcast is a three minute podcast
Podcast
A podcast is a series of digital media files that are released episodically and often downloaded through web syndication...
describing the positions of the planets in the night sky.
The planetarium hosts monthly meetings for members of the Capitol Area Astronomy Association, a group of hobbyists.