WASP News

History

The passion I hold for Astronomy stems from a lifelong fascination with the night sky.

My first telescope, which was sometime in the 1970s was a slender white tube, on a short chrome tripod, with plastic lenses.

It was, I seem to recall, mostly hopeless.

Whilst it did reveal some extra detail on the moon, the cheap optics, and tiny unstable tripod made it pretty difficult to use.

I’m fairly certain that my first proper scope came second hand from someone, and was purchased with Christmas and Birthday money.

With this Tasco scope for the first time ever I was able to see Jupiter and some of its moons, as a small disk.

This moment was like magic, made even more magical when pointing at Saturn, which was just a few degrees away from Jupiter, and being able to see the incredible sight of the maajestic rings.

Community Scope

Telescopes and binoculars have been as much of a constant in my adult life as Pianos and Motorcycles.

They are always there, and are always used, and not just for myself.

Sharing the views through various scopes and instruments with people who may never have peered into a telescope is as exciting as looking for the first time.

Even today when we are setting up our newest scopes, people will stop and chat.

Back in July 1994 I hosted a small gathering of our Neighbours who were curious about my hobby.

In actual fact they were curious about a lot of things related to me, but they were far to polite to say anything.

We met on a small green in the centre of crescent where we all lived.

I had set up my Orion Oprics reflector to hopefully see the impact of Comet Shoemaker-Levy9 striking Jupiter..

There was an equally large gathering during the transit of Venus across the Sun, which we shared with a local school.

The entire school took turns to watch, as Jane and I projected the Sun onto a large card, showing Venus sliding across the surface of the Sun.

So Why WASP

Firstly it needs to be understood where the WA in WASP originated.

At that stage in our lives, we travelled extensively and wherever we were, we took to sending a postcard home, addressed to “The Wandering Astons” hence WA.

As for the “SP” in WASP, we may not have the budget for manned flight, but we did for many years fly model rockets.

Combined with the shared passion for exploration of the Night Sky, it seemed only reasonable for the Wandering Astons to have a Space Program.

Of course any self respecting Space Program first of all needs a set of cool stickers and patches, because the WASP is way more personal than NASA.

I will leave the final words on this page to a long time hero of mine, who was an Astronomer, Author, Musician, TV Presenter, and occasionally a comedian.

The late Sir Patrick Moore CBE, who for decades was the face of Astronomy on UK Television was an essential part of my childhood experience.

The Wandering Astons were fortunate enough to meet Sir Patrick a few years ago, and this is a cherished memory.