The Astronomers

The most highly anticipated public television event since Ken Burns' The Civil War, this new series tackles no less a subject than the universe. Hosted by Richard Chamberlain, The Astronomers received generous funding (over 5 million dollars) from the W. M. Keck Foundation, and therefore offers some of the best special effects ever seen on public television. We watched the opener "Where Is the Rest of the Universe?" and it did not disappoint. The program begins by introducing John Dobson, a self-proclaimed "sidewalk astronomer" who makes (and teaches others to make) inexpensive, yet high-powered, telescopes and then sets up shop on a sidewalk inviting evening strollers to come peek into the lens. A former monk, Dobson was booted out of the monastery for making telescopes for kids. After the charming Dobson, we meet Vera Rubin, an astronomer who discovered that "dark matter" comprises approximately 90% of the universe. What this dark matter consists of is presently the focus of many astronomers--including Tony Tyson and Raja Guhathakurta, whose starwatches are profiled later in the program. Carefully balancing stories about the astronomers with their achievements and speculations for the future, The Astronomers manages to be both entertaining and instructive, and does it all with a visual flair that includes sights most of us have never seen. Concurrently released to the "home video" market, this institutional version is priced the same and just as attractively packaged, but the tapes come in hard plastic rather than cardboard boxes, and a packet of supplementary material including a teacher's guide, poster, and bibliography comes with the institutional version. Highly recommended. The other titles in the series are: Searching for Black Holes, A Window to Creation, Waves of the Future, Stardust, and Prospecting for Planets. Editor's choice. (See ARCTIC REFUGE for availability.)