An astronomy-minded friend told me there’s a way to study the sun inside Grand Central Terminal that lets you see sunspots. Is he on the level?
Strangely, yes. This advice comes from John Pazmino of Brooklyn, a founder of NYSkies Astronomy, a discussion group for home astronomy in the city:
Don’t look at the sun itself; that’s always dangerous. Instead, take a plain white sheet of paper to the terminal’s Grand Concourse around 2:30 p.m. or a half-hour each way, when the sun shines straight along Park Avenue. (The exact times vary.) The day should be sunny, clear and cloudless.
The southern wall of the Grand Concourse, facing 42nd Street, has semicircular grills high up, with small curlicued spaces like those in a leafy tree. Many of those spaces act like the aperture of a pinhole camera, reflecting an image of the sun that, when it reaches the floor, will be 8 to 12 inches wide. The smaller grill spaces will produce dimmer but sharper solar images on your paper.
Large sunspots, regions of intense magnetic activity that are cooler than the surrounding surface, will appear as dark blemishes on the solar disk. And the edges of the disk will appear darker, because the edges show mostly the sun’s outer surface, which is cooler than the center.
Learn more of the secrets of Grand Central Terminal and how it changed its neighborhood and the city on July 13 with urban historian Gordon Linzer.
About the above video: Georgette Gagnon, Deputy Director of the Africa Division for Human Rights Watch, puts forth their proposal for the redirection of Sudanese oil revenues into a Darfur Recovery Fund. Created under a UN Chapter 7 Resolution, the Fund would detract from Sudan’s ability to finance atrocities, pressuring Khartoum to accept the deployment of AU/UN peacekeepers and to end its abuses in Darfur. Gagnon also proposes further mechanisms for accountability, including targeted sanctions and ICC warrants against high-level perpetrators.
Previously, we posted video of Newsweek International editor Fareed Zakaria and Foreign Policy magazine's James Hoge discussing anti-Americanism and other topics from a May 2008 talk at the 92nd Street Y. In the 11-minute audio clip above, they cover changing aspects of terrorism, world reaction and how the U.S. should focus its strategies.
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Upcoming at the Y: Crisis in Darfur with Mia Farrow and others (Jun 30), Ed Koch in Conversation with Budd Mishkin (Sep 8) and Past and Future in the Middle East: Seven Years Since 9/11 with Noah Feldman (Sep 11)
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Previously, we posted video of Emmy Award-winning television pioneer Norman Lear's appearance at the Y with BusinessWeek Editor-in-Chief Stephen Adler for the Captains of Industry Series. In the audio clip above, Lear talks about the reaction from the All in the Family pilot by the television networks and Mickey Rooney as a casting choice for Archie Bunker.
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“This was a stunning revelation that I learned just before I left the White House… For me, it was the final moment of disillusionment, when… it came out in the legal proceedings when Patrick Fitzgerald was prosecuting Scooter Libby [that] the President had authorized the Vice President to selectively use some of that intelligence in the National Intelligence Estimate and share it anonymously with reporters. Now, he tasked Scooter Libby to do that… Here we were for years, [we] had been in the White House decrying the selective leaking of classified information. And the President had authorized that very same thing himself.” —Scott McClellan
Former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan is making headlines yet again today for his testimony before the House Judiciary Committee on what took place during the outing of former CIA operative Valerie Plame Wilson. In his opening statement, McClellan said, “I regret that I played a role, however unintentionally, in relaying false information to the public about it.”
Above, full video of Dan Rather’s recent conversation with McClellan here at the 92nd Street Y, which aired on HDNet. A full transcript of that interview is also available.
In the video above, political funny man Scott Blakeman performs at Stand-up for Democracy and among other things, talks about voting—or attempting to vote—on the Upper East Side. He’s often on the road promoting “the two comedian solution to Middle East peace” but you can catch him in the neighborhood on June 26 when he headlines an evening at the Y billed as “Laughs from the Left: A Liberal Dose of Political Humor.” He’ll be joined by comedians Jane Condon and Jeff Kreisler, a writer for Comedy Central’s Indecision 2008 and winner of the Bill Hicks Spirit Award for thought-provoking comedy.
On June 22, learn the untold history, politics and ecology of Central Park North with a walking tour of Seneca Village, the North Woods, the blockhouse constructed for the War of 1812 (see Forgotten NY’s entry), the Conservatory Gardens and more.
On May 15, Steve Coll—Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Ghost Wars: The Secret History of CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001—discussed his most recent book, The Bin Ladens: An Arabian Family in the American Century with WNYC’s Leonard Lopate at the 92nd Street Y. In the video clip above, Coll helps to untangle the web of patriarch Mohammed Bin Laden’s rotating wives, 29 daughters, 25 sons and where Osama fits in the family hierarchy.
Dave Isay, the founder of StoryCorps, has grown a modest startup about the celebration of life through listening into a national movement. Since 2003, almost 30,000 people like you have shared their personal stories and each conversation is preserved at the Library of Congress. Isay and special guests come to the Y on June 24 to discuss the nature of the project and address why individual stories matter and why oral tradition is important in defining our national identity.
In the meantime, here are three of our favorite stories now featured on the StoryCorps website:
We share in the outpouring of grief and respect for Tim Russert, one of the great voices in journalism who died today. Russert joined NBC News in 1984 and in April 1985, he supervised the live broadcasts of the Today program from Rome, negotiating and arranging an appearance by Pope John Paul II, a first for American television. In the audio clip above, recorded January 15, 1995—one of three appearances for Russert at the 92nd Street Y—he shares the story of this career highlight that took him from Philadelphia to the Vatican.
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Previously, we posted an audio excerpt of Emmy Award-winning journalist Cokie Roberts’ talk at the Y on April 8, 2008 about Ladies of Liberty: The Women Who Shaped Our Nation. More insight from the evening is provided in the video clip above where she discusses the relationship between Aaron Burr, Vice President of the United States under Thomas Jefferson, and his daughter Theodosia.
Upcoming at the Y: Barbara Walters in Conversation with Frank Rich (Jun 17), The Democratic Prospects: Politics in Russia, the Arab World and China with Ralph Buultjens (Jun 23), Laughs from the Left: A Liberal Dose of Political Humor with Scott Blakeman, Jane Condon and Jeff Kreisler (Jun 26) and Crisis in Darfur with Mia Farrow and others (Jun 30)
Last week [author of What Color Is Your Parachute? Richard] Bolles was in New York and gave some contemporary pointers in his talk at the 92nd Street Y in Manhattan. Here are some highlights.
1. Newspaper classified advertisements have been surpassed by online job postings.
3. Very large job posting sites like Monster.com may not be as effective as the smaller ones because there are too many jobs with complicated job titles.
James Fallows, longtime correspondent for The Atlantic now based in China, offers the southern view from his apartment in the Guomao area of Beijing. Apparently the pollution index is off the charts as factory production levels have been extended in preparation for the Olympics. Read his June article, China’s Silver Lining, to find out “why smoggy skies over Beijing represent the world’s greatest environmental opportunity.”
For more perspective, Ralph Buultjens, a leading analyst of world affairs, will discuss China’s phenomenal economic growth and its political consequences in a talk titled The New World: The Chinese Design at the Y on June 12.
On May 8, Senator Harry Reid sat down with veteran journalist Jeff Greenfield at the 92nd Street Y to talk about his personal journey, tireless work in the Senate and the upcoming election. In the audio clip above, Senator Reid explains how Congress has been doing its best to "purge our legislative souls from the Gingrich years" in the hopes of ending gridlock in Washington.
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Upcoming at the Y: Bill Moyers in Conversation with Phil Donahue: On Democracy (Jun 10), Drew Westen, PhD, on the Political Brain (Jun 12), Barbara Walters in Conversation with Frank Rich (Jun 17) and Laughs from the Left: A Liberal Dose of Political Humor with Scott Blakeman, Jane Condon and Jeff Kreisler (Jun 26)
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When Vail Barrett heard about the 92nd Street Y’s Share Your Story program, he was eager to make an appointment to talk about his thoughts of the Y and the connection he feels through his grandfather, James G. McDonald, the first U.S. Ambassador to Israel and subject of the recent biography, Advocate for the Doomed. In the video above, Mr. Barrett speaks thoughtfully and with great passion for his family and the Y.
