Fred Watson - Good Morning Starshine

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• published: 08 Oct 2014
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The Cuban missile crisis, the musical 'Hair', and the Moon landings - hallmarks of a decade that brought bigger changes than almost any other in history. And the changes wrought in the sleepy shire of Coonabarabran during the 1960s were bigger than most. With the opening of the first large telescope on Siding Spring Mountain in 1964 - the ANU 1-metre - Coonabarabran suddenly found itself transformed into the astronomy capital of Australia. By the end of the decade, the decision had been made to site one of the world's largest telescopes there – the 3.9-metre Anglo-Australian Telescope (AAT) – cementing Siding Spring's reputation as a major international observatory. No wonder people were singing about starshine. This year marks a triple anniversary for Siding Spring: the opening of the site itself (1964) and the inauguration of Australia's two largest telescopes, the AAT (1974) and the ANU 2.3-metre (1984). With the theme of StarFest firmly centred on these anniversaries, Fred Watson goes back to the 1960s to explore the origins of the Observatory before providing a whistle-stop tour of the amazing discoveries that have been made there since. Don’t miss it, man. Be there or be square. Groovy, baby.