Birkenau - A village with more than 200 Sundials

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Published: 17 September 2021

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Seattle, WA wants to call itself the sundial capital of the world, but it runs a pale second to Birkenau, Germany. This small village in the south of Germany with about 10,000 inhabitants holds the record as the village with the highest density of sundials in the world. (https://www.sonnenuhren-birkenau.de/service-269/news/news-details/world-record-for-the-village-of-sundials.html). You can find sundials everywhere: on homes, in gardens, on the walls of public buildings, and there is even a Sundial Park with 28 dials by Vinzenz Philippi a sundialist from the Saarland region and 5 other dials from other dialists.

The Birkenau Sundial Society offers tours of the village sundials in German or English. If you venture out on your own there are four sundial trails with each dial clearly labeled.The majority of the dials are vertical and easily visible from the street. The second most polular dial is the Equatorial.

For only 2€ you can get the Birkenau sundial cube, a decorated cardboard box with a horizontal sundial on top. https://www.sonnenuhren-birkenau.de/service/kontakt.html The dial's gnomon is a pencil set for Birenau's latitude and longitude (40.5 deg N, 8.7 deg W).

The Birkenau Sundial Society promotes and preserves the historical sundials in Birkenau, constructs new sundials and documents all of them. https://www.sonnenuhren-birkenau.de/sundials-in-birkenau.html

Adler Astronomy Live - Time, Culture, and Social Change

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Published: 07 October 2020

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Every Thursday at noon central time the Adler Planetarium presnts "Adler Astronomy Live" with a variety of interesting topics and speakers. 

On Thrsday Oct 8th, 2020 the series presents Dr. Sara Schechner on the topic of Time, Culture, and Social Change.  As the Adler website states:

"The Adler Planetarium has the best and most comprehensive collection of sundials in North America. Sundials played a central role in shaping people’s sense of time, and show how the latter has been influenced by their culture, politics, religion, labor, society, and geography throughout the ages. Join us for a conversation with Dr. Sara J. Schechner, author of Time of Our Lives: Sundials of the Adler Planetarium, on some of the most spectacular sundials in the Adler’s collections and their stories. Set a reminder on YouTube"

Dr. Schechner is an engaging speaker with a wealth of experience in historical instruments and has a passion for sundials.  Adler has recently published the beautifully illustrated book Time of Our Lives: Sundials of the Adler Planetarium. The North American Sundial Society helped underwrite the production of this book, nearly a decade in the making.

To hear the presentation live or in recording after the event, go directly the Adler's YouTube channel to find the presentation at: https://www.youtube.com/adlerplanetarium

Twilight of Sundials?

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Published: 20 February 2019

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It's rare that a sundialist casts a shadow on UK education, but that's exactly what Dr. Frank King did the other day in a BBC interview (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cambridgeshire-47133011). Dr. King, a Fellow in Computer Science at Churchill College, has long been intrigued with time remarking to the BBC in an interview, "Anything from atomic clocks to the most ancient of sundials I can tell you about." He is Keeper of the Clock, responsible for Cambridge University's official timepiece on Great St. Mary's Church. But the number of people interested in sundials is on the wane. As president of the British Sundial Society,(a group like the North American Sundial Society who all truly enjoy time systems and the anciernt and beautiful art of designing sundials) Dr. King notes with sadness that the number of people who "really understand" the science behind sundials "are few and far between..... There seems to be no teaching of spherical triangles, and very little teaching of solid geometry. How many school leavers have heard of Euclid?"

Some could argue that who needs sundials in this age of digital watches, GPS navigation, and fit-bit monitors? The UK Register reports that "[Dr.] King would likely be deeply saddened to know, then, that there are people of adult age out there incapable of reading analogue clocks." But for those interested in promoting STEM in schools and getting students excited in something beyond designing a video game, the study of sundials offers a wonderful perspective. As stated by the BBC, "Dr. King strongly believes the sundial - 'the perfect collaboration of science and art' - has a place in the digital age. But he is concerned that the skills needed to create them may dwindle, and believes education could play a greater role."

The development of an aethetically pleasing sundial involves using digital computer aided design tools that sometimes significantly altering classic designs. Sundials requires artisan skill and craft for the selection of materials, casting, engraving  and even 3D printing of dials. A sense of artistic proportion is needed to create pleasing embellishments that still remain true to the underlying mathematics that convey acurate time. Artist, sculpture, craftsman, geometer, mathematician, computer programmer, engraver and metal worker are but a few of the talents encompassing the talents of a dialist.

Read more at:
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/02/18/sundials_dying_out_and_millennials_are_to_blame/

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/02/17/sundials-risk-dying-young-people-arent-interested-cambridge/

Roll-Top Ribbon Cutting

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Published: 02 October 2016

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Amid the rain and cloudy skies, on Saturday October 1st, 2016, a ribbon-cutting ceremony officially opened the Roll-Top Observatory at Observatory Park, Turner Farm in Great Falls, VA. Tim Hackman, Dranesville District representative of the Fairfax County Park Authority (FCPA) Board, introduced all those who made the Roll-Top observatory possible through public-community-and-private funding. Initiated in 2007 in collaboration with the Analemma Society, the million-dollar facility was funded in part by the 2008 and 2012 Park Bonds, telecommunications funds, Mastenbrook grant money and a donation provided by Jean and Rick Edelman through the Fairfax County Park Foundation.

Ground breaking for Roll-Top began in 2014 and over the next two years the Roll-Top Observatory design by architects Shaffer Wilson Sarver & Gray of Herndon, VA, was carried out by the construction company Brown and Root of Arlington, VA.

Read more: Roll-Top Ribbon Cutting

Sundial Outreach Success

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Published: 01 May 2014

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This year nearly 300,000 students, parents and teachers attended the 3^rd USA Science and Engineering Festival in Washington DC during 25-27 April 2014.   The Analemma Society and the North American Sundial Society jointly featured a very successful booth to encourage science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) through sundials. The Analemma Society and NASS were among hundreds of exhibits from universities, scientific organizations, government agencies, and companies in the defense and educational industries.

Volunteers from the Analemma Society and NASS demonstrated a number of sundial types and provided paper sundial cut-outs that were enjoyed by children, students, parents and teachers alike. They handed out over 1400 of the sundial cut-outs, with the classic horizontal sundial and Briggs polar dial being the most popular.  Especially important were the numerous contacts made with teachers who will now enhance their science classes with sundials.

Volunteers from the Analemma Society and NASS who made this outreach possible were Ken Clark, Jeff Kretsch, Bob Kellogg and Dru Anne Neil.  They did a terrific job explaining that indeed, sundials are the world’s oldest clocks.

In the photo at left NASS member Ken Clark and Analemma Society member Jeff Kretsch show how sundials work while you dialists cut out their sundials.