The Carlton Observatory in Yamhill County is working to raise funds to build a new community science center complete with a planetarium, observatory, and maker-space at McMinnville’s Evergreen Aviation and Space Museum.
On Friday night, the nonprofit group will host a star talk at the Evergreen Museum with Shane Larson, research associate professor of physics at Northwestern University. Larson will discuss how a breakthrough by astronomer Henrietta Swan Leavitt first allowed humans to measure the true size and scale of the universe.
The idea for an observatory began when Forrest Babcock and Janet Zuelke, a husband-and-wife team, started to wonder what they should do with what Zuelke described as their “big blue telescope.”
This photo, which was obtained from the Carlton Observatory, shows Forrest Babcock with the “Big Blue Telescope” in 2019.
Courtesy of Carlton Observatory
