Mississauga Centre RASC

90th Meeting

                                                            Speaker’s Night        

                                                   

 

Day:                Friday September 14, 2007

 

Speaker:            Randy Attwood

                            

 

Astronomy Toronto: A Successful Cable TV Series on Astronomy

 

Randy Attwood, President of the Mississauga Centre produced an astronomy show on cable TV from 1981 to 1994 with 62 programs totaling 40 hours.  Initially the shows were taped live, and later in studio on location.  Visuals were important.  Phone calls and audience participation was an important feature and the RASC was be given good promotion. 

 

Randy has always had an interest in television and media.  In 1980 there was an almost total lack of information about astronomy and space on television with space probes (Voyagers) planet flyby’s getting 30 to 60 second time-clips only on the news.  The only other coverage was the PBS NOVA series and a TVO program in 1970 hosted by Dr. Helen Hogg.  In September 1980, Randy wrote to 6 cable companies.  Rogers East York agreed to 3 trial shows and provided one Rogers employee.    Randy’s group was to provide the rest of the crew.   At no point was Randy asked what he would talk about.  The crew trained for 5 weeks, built a set, arranged lighting and taped 3 shows in 1981. A 16 year-old RASC member painted the 3-d set.  The production crew learned the technicalities as time went along.  The production team also assumed that the audience knew nothing but by the end of each show they would know much more.

 

Ian McGregor helped host the first three shows:  1. Canadian Astronomy,  2. Voyager 1 at Saturn,  3. Solar Eclipses.   The first show aired on January 30, 1981.  After the initial trial of three shows, the series was continued with the studio at Adelaide and Victoria and later in Don Mills for a further 5 more shows in 1981.  The fourth show was “Canada and the Space Shuttle” with Chris Browning of Spar Aerospace. The fifth about “Early Astronomy in Toronto featured Dr. Helen Hogg from the Astronomy Department at the University of Toronto who discussed the Leonid meteor shower of 1833 and the formation of the Toronto Astronomical Society in 1868. 

 

The first live phone-in took place in 1981.  That year featured shows about the DDO, the summer sky, Voyager at Saturn.  During one show in 1982, a phone-in for the project manager for the Canadarm, Dr. Art Hunter, took place.  Shows in 1983 discussed UFO’s, ten years after Apollo, moons of the outer solar system, life and death of stars, solar eclipses.  In 1983/84, topics included Halley’s Comet, cosmology, the May 30 annular eclipse, summer skies, the Algonquin Radio Telescope, and first Canadian astronaut.  In 1985, there was a show on the solar eclipse in Papua New Guinea, observing the Moon, Jupiter, and black holes.  In 1986 a live 2 hour phone-in during the flyby of Voyager at Uranus features images from the planet as they were received by JPL.  

 

Randy showed numerous video clips from the shows including Roberta Bondar, the launch of the first Canadian astronaut Marc Garneau on October 5, 1984, an interview with Charles Duke the 10th man on the Moon.

 

Season 8 featured Mars in 1988, the Philippines solar eclipse, the SEYI conference, astronomy from Australia, Comet Halley, supernova Shelton, light pollution.  The last 3 shows featured a live total lunar eclipse, the solar eclipse of 1991, and the annular solar eclipse of May 10, 994 live from the planetarium.  The lunar eclipse show of August 16, 1989 was very successful and was picked up by other cable companies.  The 1991 solar eclipse show was composed of videos form various locations and required a great deal of editing.  The May 1994 annular eclipse was the last show because Rogers was now dictating content. 

 

 

Submitted by Chris Malicki, Secretary  Chris Malicki, Secretary                               back to Miss Centre. meeting reports page
Mississauga Centre RASC