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(Written by Hank Bartlett)

This astronomical verse is of a universe, where this A.V. Douglas winner roams,
It's all about observing achievements and observatory domes.
A variable observer this member is and that does not mean indifferent,
It means the searching of the sky, for stars variably luminescent!

We now take this story to its root and a young man with a dream,
To trek the sky from low to high and record what he has seen.
1980 he started this trek, and across the sky did navigate
heavenly sights on available nights, with his new C8.

Just 4 years later on this spot an observatory he did build.
And there he looked and searched the sky until many log books he had filled.
For astronomical help and fellowship other astronomers he did seek.
And through the years as Librarian, National Rep, and President he did speak.

What else you ask has this man done with his astronomical life?
Everything possible to avoid an astronomical wife!
Aperture fever, eclipse expeditions, the Ridiculous, and CCDs.
Building robo domes and web sites just to mention a few of these.

Technology has now changed the game and he can observe while he does sleep.
And if anything out of the ordinary happens Merlin lets out a peep.
But some observing takes a trained eye, no other way it can be done.
And leads to the discovery of SUPERNOVA 2007cf in MCG +02-39-21!

By now many of you know the universe that in the first line was written.
It's "Walter's Universe" and it is no curse that by the astronomy bug he was bitten.

Ladies and Gentlemen: 2007 A. Vibert Douglas Award winner Walter MacDonald.

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The A. Vibert Douglas Award, which is named after the founder of the Kingston Center, is the centre's highest honour and is bestowed upon members who have made a significant contribution to the Kingston Centre or to Astronomy and its allied sciences.

This year's recipient has worked on the Executive level, since becoming a member of the Centre 9 years ago. Our winner came from Western Ontario, has helped at many public observing events, Astronomy Day, Fall N Stars and has been the Centre Treasurer for over 7 years and has served as Kingston's National Council Representative for the past two years, in fact just today, he attended by teleconference of the National Council meeting, of which I am sure there will be lots to tell at a future date.

It gives me great pleasure to announce the winner of this year's winner A.V. Douglas Award, if you don't know by now, its none other than Mr. John Hurley of Sharbot Lake, via Windsor.

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Is it a meteor, is it a bolide, is it an asteroid........No its our newest winner of the A. Vibert Douglas award. This award is the highest award from the Kingston Centre that can be bestowed upon someone. The A.Vibert Douglas award is named after the founder of the Kingston Centre. The award is for service, including longstanding dedication, contributions to the Centre or the Society, or for an astronomical achievement. This award is intended to be presented and recognize the contribution and or achivement by a member of the Centre.

He makes sure that the members are entertained every month, and gets us our speakers, though that is part of the job, he never gets to enjoy them because he is either on the road or getting ready to hit it. In his spare time, and from what his wife says isn't much, he scoures the websites for the Kingston Centre for utlitmate deal so we can all enjoy the new filters, eyepieces or focusers.

We see him now and then as he pops out for air now and then, and he shows us his new scopes.....when he observes with them , but not as much as he likes, but he makes the dark sky trips to Nirvana, or to his own observatory. He makes it to the star party social gatherings to see what is new on the field, and try to wangle a deal there.

Our winner tonight, has been a member since January 1996. We hardly ever see him, but he is there, he is the phantom, the avid astronomer and observer, the blurried eyed helper on the KAON decks. Who jumps to help no matter what you doing? The man with the green laser!

He is a kind, courteous, friendly and a true friend, volunteer above the call of duty and above all follows the Astro Rant.......

See also: Regulus, Dec 2005, pages 1 and 3.

I am not an astrologer
or a fortune teller,

And I don't live in a gypsy wagon
or own a crystal ball,

I don't know Jimmie, Sally or Suzie from the psychic hotline
although I am certain they are really, really, weird.

Duh, I have an (list all Norm scopes)
Equatorial Newtonian's
not a fig newton.

I speak my own tongue not the tongue of those who are deceased,
and I say "Boötes" not Boots.

I can proudly mount my scope in my yard,
I have DARK SKY!
I believe in minimal lighting, not security floodlamps,
eyepiece observing not CCD imaging,
and that the Dobsonian is a truly noble and simple mount.

A toque is a dust cover, a chesterfield a meteor observing platform,
and it is pronounced Schmidt, not shit, Schmidt.

Canada will have one of the smallest telescopes in orbit, but has the only
arm, and the United States would not have gotten to the Moon in '69
without us.

My name is NORM WELBANKS, and I AM, AN ASTRONOMER!

Please help me congratulate the 2005 winner of the A.Vibert Douglas award Kingston Centre's highest award, that truck driving, phantom, rocker and astronomer skyguy "Norm Welbanks".

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Don stepped in and ran many of the events the Centre has become well known for, including Chair of the Fall'N'Stars Committee, Astronomy Day, and Sky Is The Limit Festival.

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Jan was an enthusiastic and contributing member, adding his expertise in the construction of the Venor telescope, running the CCD group this year and more.

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The A. Vibert Douglas Award is the centre's highest honour and is bestowed upon members who have made a significant contribution to the Kingston Centre or to Astronomy and its sister sciences. This year's recipient has made several very important contributions to our centre ever since joining the centre several years ago. From providing guidance, wisdom and elbow grease for several of our telescope making projects, to making major contributions to our education efforts, this person has been on the front lines of some of our most ambitious adventures. This person has also played a role in centre politics, serving as President and also spending several years as the head of the Amateur Telescope Makers group. Most recently he has shepherded the construction of the Robert Venor Telescope project. From beginner to expert, we have all learned something from this knowledgeable, humble and generous man. It gives me great pleasure to announce the winner of this year's A.V. Douglas Award, and greater pleasure still to claim him as a member of Kingston Centre. He is none other than Douglas Angle.

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This year's recipient of our centre's highest award has much in common with our founder, for whom the award is named. Showing selfless dedication to the centre and its well-being, this person has been actively involved in centre activities since joining us. Having served on the GA organizing committee in 1997, our winner then went on to serve as National Council Representative, Secretary, Astronomy Day Coordinator, and has also taken part in many public events, usually as part of the committee that organized them. She has also been the organizer of the annual banquet. In short, whatever activity our centre is involved in, Susan Gagnon is there ready to make things happen. She is our ray of sunshine and the energy that moves us. Thank you Susan, for making our centre the finest in the RASC.

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has been a long time member of the Kingston Center, and a frequent contributor to the center's activities over the years. In the past year, Hank has been coordinator of the Youth Observing Group, a responsibility he has executed well. Hank has donated prizes for fundraising draws at the monthly meetings, and conducted many of those draws himself. Hank is a frequent participant in the public and center observing sessions, and has been somewhat of an informal social convenor for the Kingston contingent at Starfest, and the Center's overnight observing session. Hank is this year's recipient of the A. Vilbert Douglas Award.

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Dr. Tom Dean has been an active participant in 1999 and past years. In 1998 he was chair of both the observing and ATM committees. He negotiated the acquisition of the 24" mirror blank, and has contributed to the organization, design and grinding. He has also helped with the Youth Group, as well as organizing the Public and members-only observing sessions. The public sessions in particular are well attended, and have resulted in several new members to the center. For Tom' efforts in many areas, and his contribution to the growth of the Center, we present this award.

Laura Gagne is Vice-President, chair of the education committee, and past co-chair of the youth group. She is editor of the Students Guide to Careers in Space, and Expanding Their Universe - The Ontario Teachers Companion To Grade 9 Astronomy. Laura has also participated in many observing sessions, mirror grinding, and other Kingston Center activities. As a result of her efforts, the Kingston Center produced a seminar for Secondary School teachers to introduce them to Astronomy. For Laura's many and varied efforts, her contribution to the growth in membership and finances, we present her with this award.

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The winner of this years award joined the Kingston Center in 1989 and has been a member for 9 years; has been the Astronomy Day Coordinator; has helped various Bronwie and Guide groups earn their astronomy badge throughout the years; have given many interesting talks to our members; was Chairperson for the very successful 1997 GA and has been President for the past 3 years. And I am sure that I have left out many things done behind the scenes. Tonight I am proud to present this award to my friend and yours, Peggy Hurley.

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This year's recipient is certainly deserving of the award as she carries on the spirit of Dr. Douglas. Dr. Judith Irwin as been the liason between Kingston Centre and the Physics Department at Queen's. She has given wonderful talks to the centre about her research and was a featured speaker at the General Assembly this past June. Dr. Irwin acts as our sponsor, ensuring us a place to meet and is actively involved in our centre especially helping to educate the public about astronomy through observatory open houses and the newpaper column "Stargazer" in Kingston this week which she writes with her husband, Dieter Bruekner. We are all very proud of her and congratulate her on receiving this award.

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This year's winner of the A. Vibert Douglas award has, true to the spirit of the award, made very substantial contributions to the operation and well-being of the RASC Kingston Centre. For the past several years, she has spent many hours keeping the centre's finances and correspondence in order, writing beautifully worded annual reports summarizing the centre's activities each year, booking the meetings with Queen's University, handling Observer's Handbook distribution and membership renewals, and much, much more.

I am speaking of none other than Kim Hay, of course. Kim has served the centre for three years as Secretary and is embarking on her third year as Treasurer. In fact, Kim actually held both the positions of Secretary and Treasurer simultaneously during 1993! There are few people indeed that could handle such a tremendous responsibility as this, but Kim not only handled, it, she excelled at it. More recently, Kim has taken on the task of managing the Society's promotional items, and in doing so, has raised the profile of the Kingston Centre at the National level of our Society.

As you can see, Kim's influence has been greatly felt throughout the Kingston Centre over the past few years. But I should mention also that her influence is felt not just in "normal" space. Through her operation of the "Moonlight Cascade BBS" (a member of the RASCNet), Kingston Centre members have yet another venue in which to pursue their hobby: in "cyberspace!"

In summary, Kim Hay's enthusiasm, hard work, and good humour have enriched the centre tremendously, and it is with great pleasure that I present the 1994 A. Vibert Douglas Award to her.

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See also: Regulus, Nov-Dec 1988, page 10.

The following is the citation read by Leo Enright at the time of the presentation of the award by our Honorary President David Levy to Christine on October 1, 1993:

This year's winner of the Dr. A. Vibert Douglas Award is a long-time member of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada, and has been a member of both the Edmonton and Kingston Centres. She has brought a wealth of enthusiasm and new ideas to the office of President of the Kingston Centre. We have had our membership numbers grow to a figure never-before-seen in the thirty-two year history of our Centre. She has arranged for a stunning variety of guest speakers for our meetings, and has seen that our programs have included topics of interest for the veteran and neophyte, for young and old, for the generalist and the specialist, for the enthusiastic deep-sky observer as well as the sedentary armchair astronomer. For the first time in the Centre's history, a committee sparked to action by the President is considering hosting a General Assembly of the Society. Numerous other ideas for promoting astronomy are being seriously worked on. Little wonder then that, on behalf of the Kingston Centre, we are proud to present our Centre's major award, the Dr. A. Vibert Douglas Award, to our President, Christine Kulyk.

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See also: Regulus, Jan-Feb 1988, pp.1-2.

The following is the text of the citation prepared by your editor and read by our Centre President on the occasion of the award presentation at our December Annual Meeting.

Mr. Hein Van Asperen has contributed generously and enormously to the Kingston Centre over the past number of years. He has served for three consecutive years as Alternate Council Representative or National Council Representative, and in the current year he is serving as the Vice-President of the Centre. His presence has been felt in a very positive way because of his contribution at National Council. Hein has made numerous presentations at meetings of our Centre in order to share his knowledge and expertise with other members of the group. He has for years been an active solar observer, and his remarkable drawings and precise observations of sunspots and solar activity from day to day have often added considerably to our observing reports. The night-time sky, also, has been the target for many of his observations, as he puts to good use his Questar telescope. A solar eclipse expedition in 1984 was an additional special event that he experienced and reported to our Centre.

His high-precision calculations and methodical procedures for solving complicated problems of positional astronomy have become well known. Indeed, some of his calculations for the solving of age-old navigational problems were worthy of the attention of our naval authorities.

At three of the past General Assemblies there have been exceptionally good entries of his in the display competitions, all of them constructed with the diligence and care for detail which Hein puts into everything that he does. In addition, at one of the General Assemblies, he presented a well-received paper outlining his work in solving a classic navigational problem. Readers of our Society’s National Newsletter have also recently noted an article of his concerning eighteenth century telescopes built by Jan Pieters van der Bildt.

Hein’s contribution to our Centre has involved considerable time and effort. Only a few members of our Centre members have to drive as far as he does in order to attend our regular monthly meetings; yet, Hein misses very few of them. Indeed, he is one of the most eager supporters of Astronomy Day activities and the numerous other ventures undertaken by our organization.

For these and other reasons, we are proud to present the Dr. A. Vibert Douglas Award, the major award of the Kingston Centre, to Mr. Hein van Asperen.

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All the members of our group aware of the fact that Larry Manuel has contributed significantly to the R. A. S. C. - Kingston Centre over the past two year. He is the type of amateur astronomer whose work and dedication are too often neglected but need to be recognized. The criteria for the Dr. A. Vibert Douglas Award states that it may be given for service to the Centre or Society and/or an astronomical achievement. What Larry has done could be categorized as both a service to our Centre and an achievement. Restoring the Centre's 10-inch telescope by completing a handsome Dobsonian mount for it and making it much more useable than it has ever been is an important accomplishment in line with what many astronomical groups are doing to increase observing time for themselves and the general public, and it is a service to our Centre whose members have long had a good telescope but one which had been virtually unuseable because of a faulty mount. It was Larry who had the initiative to undertake a project that was completed very successfully. Unless he had done it, our scope would probably have remained in its former condition for many more years, and that would have been pity.

A recent presentation to our Centre of Larry's personal project to build a 3-inch refractor also represents a considerable achievement. It has been a long time since our Centre had a member who has been involved in a telescope-building project of any real significance and the expertise which Larry is gaining first-hand is also a service to our Centre because he has shared his learning experience with us and is always most willing to talk about the vast amount of information he has gleaned in this area - one that is often shunned by many astronomers today, who usually prefer to buy everything off the shelf and neatly prepackaged. Larry indicates that his refractor-building project is only the first of several. This initiative is something that promises to make a good many of our future meetings very interesting as we follow the construction of increasingly larger refractors. There seems to be something about such projects that is inherent in the way that true amateur astronomers were meant to practise their craft. The members of the Kingston Centre are, therefore, most proud to make the second presentation of the Dr. A. Vibert Douglas Award to Larry Manuel.

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The following is the text of the citation which was read on the occasion of the first presentation of our Centre's new award, the Dr. A. Vibert Douglas Award, which was presented by our National President, Dr. Roy Bishop at our twenty-fifth anniversary celebrations [January 23, 1986]. The winner, as most of our readers know, was our hard-working president, David Stokes.

All the members of the Kingston Centre are aware of the fact that Mr. David M. Stokes has provided excellent leadership as president of the R. A. S. C. - Kingston Centre over the past two year. He is the type of amateur a astronomer who quietly thinks about methods of improving our meetings and the ways we do things as a group and then sets about the task of carrying out those plans all the while doing the job in an effective and unassuming way.

He is a person who is always eager to share his special interests in astronomy. Over the past two years he has assisted the staff of a camp site in organizing its plans for building an observatory. He has himself observed the sky in many different countries through which he has travelled, and on several occasions has sent back correspondence about what it was like to observe the stars in some of the very distant regions of the globe.

Most of all in recent years he has used his computer to do many kinds of calculations involving astronomy and spherical mathematics. His special interests are the calculations of orbits of solar system objects, and in this area he has done some amazing work which rates with the best in the country. Many times he has shown his eagerness to share his computer knowledge and resources to help other members of the Centre and the Society.

His special interest in Astronomy Day and all the Centre's activities has meant that he has given up a great deal of his own free time to assist the group. As well as being president for two years, he has for a number of years been our Centre's librarian.

The members of the Kingston Centre, therefore, are proud to have David Stokes as our president and think he is a most worthy first recipient of the Dr. A. Vibert Douglas Award.

Congratulations, David! Your hard work, service, and dedication to the Centre are appreciated.

Reference: Regulus, Mar-Apr 1986, p3-4.

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