From Stet News: Wastin’ away in deep space — Jimmy Buffett’s telescopes gifted to local stargazing club
Astronomical Society of the Palm Beaches accepts four telescopes from late musician, now seeks permanent home in Palm Beach County.
More than two years after his death, four of Buffett’s telescopes have landed with the Astronomical Society of the Palm Beaches, a gift from the singer’s estate that has reinvigorated the club’s longtime wish upon a star for a permanent home.
The local amateur astronomers are hoping the donation will spark community interest and help raise money to build a modest observatory in Palm Beach County where the Buffett telescopes and others can be shared with the public.
They don’t have a site yet, but they have a potential name: The Jimmy Buffett Memorial Observatory.
“The quality of these scopes is remarkable. They should be great for the club members who want to learn basic astrophotography,” said ASPB President Bob Barr.
Valued at more than $20,000, the scopes are stored at the homes of a few club members. A dedicated home for the club would “allow us to keep his telescope collection together, along with other donated telescopes,” Barr said.
Buffett owned seven telescopes when he died. His three children each took one. The other four, geared for astrophotography, are more complicated to operate.
“We could have tried to sell them and made some money,” Hinson said, “but I went to Jimmy’s wife and explained the situation: ‘Why don’t you let me find a place to donate them so they can be put to use?’ She agreed 100 percent.”
The goal is for the Buffett equipment to one day be the centerpiece of a modest observatory with a rolling roof, a home base of operation where members can store their telescopes, offer public night viewings and hold monthly meetings.
Richard Branson bet him a trip into space
As they got to know Hinson, club members learned more about his connection to Buffett and about the musician’s love for the stars.
Hinson, 48, had been working as a special ed teacher at his alma mater, John I. Leonard High School (class of 1995), when he took a year off in 2001 to work as a nanny for Buffett’s children.
It was the start of what Hinson calls a 25-year “adventure,” traveling on the family’s private plane, often piloted by Buffett, and meeting billionaire Richard Branson, who in 2013 played a charity tennis match against Buffett with a tantalizing prize for the winner: If Buffett won, Branson would send him into space. If Branson won, Buffett would perform a free concert.
“Jimmy was very gracious in defeat, and soon swapped his racquet for his guitar. The music was good that night!” Branson wrote in a blog.
Buffett, himself a billionaire, was credentialed by NASA to cover John Glenn’s return flight in 1998 for Rolling Stone magazine. A year later, he released the album “Beach House on the Moon,” the title song’s lyrics about “… relics from Apollo trips, when the Earthmen came to play, and a hammock from a distant star, out in the Milky Way.”
Read the full article at: Wastin’ away in deep space — Jimmy Buffett’s telescopes gifted to local stargazing club
Quin Travers, treasurer of the Astronomical Society of the Palm Beaches, with the largest of the four Buffett telescopes. (Photo: Courtesy of Bob Barr)
The three smaller Jimmy Buffett telescopes arrayed in Bob Barr’s backyard. (Photo: Courtesy of Bob Barr)