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Collections & Hobbies

Your next hobby might be one night sky away

3/6/2024

Greg Woolever and his growing collection of telescopes.

When the sun sets, a quick trip outside of the city limits to avoid the light pollution can provide a glimpse into what’s above us at all times. While a sky full of twinkling lights or shooting stars is a pretty sight, there’s still so much more to see.

Des Moines Astronomical Society (DMAS) Observatory Director Greg Woolever grew up in the Beaverdale neighborhood and attended Cornell College in Mount Vernon, where he double majored in philosophy and religion. He says his love for science helped set the building blocks for why he got into astronomy.

“It started shortly before retiring,” he said. “I always had an interest in the sciences. So there was a fit there, but I hadn’t really focused on it. What really triggered my interest was in 2007 there were articles in the newspaper saying there had been some unexpected activity to 17P/Holmes (a periodic comet in the solar system). It had suddenly gotten way brighter than anybody thought,” Woolever said.

He decided to take a look with a regular pair of binoculars. 

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“So I pointed it there, and suddenly there’s this great big fuzzy ball,” Woolever said. “I said ‘Oh, that’s crazy.’ I sort of had the feeling like, ‘Well, what else is up there?’ ” 

Greg Woolever captured this image of the M82 and M83 galaxies.

Woolever began attending the DMAS public nights that were held on Saturdays in order to use their telescopes to get a better look at the sky. After some time, he decided to buy some of his own.

The telescopes in Woolever’s growing collection perform a staggering number of actions. With the typical telescope, the user points at the sky and takes a look. He also has GoTo telescopes that do as they are named. Users enter the coordinates the telescope is to point at, and it automatically goes to the location. Some have as many as 40,000 objects in the sky that are already programmed into the system. As such, users simply select an object, and the telescope will begin pointing in its direction.

“The GoTo was appealing to me because I didn’t really know where these things were,” Woolever said. “Here in a place like Ankeny with an urban environment, you can’t see very good. But when you have magnification, well then it’ll show you some stuff. I’ve just had so much fun with that,” he said.

Over time with his increasing knowledge of the sky, Woolever began talking to groups and doing demonstrations. This led to more instruments he wanted to acquire to aid in his teachings.

This is another example of what Greg Woolever has been able to capture through astrophotography.

“I found that, when I was going out talking to groups, this (smaller telescope) was really convenient to carry, and I could show how it works to track and point it at objects,” he said. “So I bought this one Celestron, which is similar, but it’s quite a bit heavier. I could use that in a classroom for demonstrations.” 

With certain telescopes comes the ability to perform astrophotography. Woolever showed some of the photos he was able to capture of the M81 and M82 galaxies, which are off the cup of The Big Dipper. Woolever heard both could be seen in one view, but that proved to be more challenging than he imagined. He was originally using paper diagrams in order to spot the galaxies but eventually switched to the app “SkySafari,” which proved successful.

“I cried because that was what I could see in the end,” said Woolever, showing the image he was able to capture after years of searching.  

Some of Woolever’s favorite places for viewing the night sky include the Ashton Observatory in Mingo and Whiterock Conservancy in Coon Rapids. 

Woolever has a few other favorite moments outside of spotting the M82 and M83 galaxies in the same shot. These happened during his time working with the Ashton Observatory.

“The responses of ‘WOW!’ that we get when a visitor sees Saturn for the first time are great,” he said. “We get similar responses for some other targets, but Saturn does it the most.”

Woolever’s other notable moments are from teaching or working with a group of children. He appreciates the thanks he receives from parents for introducing their kids into this world or simply being patient with them during the observations.

“I never get tired of showing amazing views of the night sky and getting joyful responses,” he said.

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