By P.A. Sévigny
As one of the few areas close to Montreal where the city’s ambient light pollution is kept to a bare minimum, Nuns’ Island activist Serge Bellemare said it was only a matter of time before the city’s amateur astronomers began to use the parks along the island’s shoreline to set up their telescopes for a regular look at the stars.
As yet another addition to the island’s vibrant social life, the new astronomer’s club will be holding its first meeting at the Elgar Center at 1900 on Tuesday, the 27th of April. The new club’s initial lecture will be given by André Gendron, a well-known member of the Montreal Planetarium’s Astronomy Society. Entitled ‘From our Solar System to the farthest edge of Universe’, Bellemare said Gendron’s lecture could be the ideal lecture for the club’s inaugural season. While new members will be taught how to use assorted computer programs to find specific stars and their galaxies, Bellemare told The Suburban he especially hopes to see young people at the meeting because the retired French professor said there’s always a place for a fresh new face and a fresh new mind.
Apart from a steady schedule of meetings and lectures, the club will also be organizing summer evening trips to nearby Hemmingford for deeper looks into space free from all of the city’s ambient light pollution. Bellemare said everyone is welcome and should anybody require any more information, they can contact him at sbell@mmic.net.