The September 2018 edition of Astronomy magazine has an article titles Minting a Celestial Memory. The synopsis says, "Coins made as far back as 400 B.C. may honor solar eclipses. The tradition continued for two millennia." There's the overall text about the topic PLUS pictures and descriptions of specific coins. Obviously of most interest to collectors of ancient coins.
I witnessed my first full eclipse last year. Had I been walking this planet five hundred years ago before science could simply explain what this big black hole was in the sky.... I would have been quite confident that I was witnessing some divine event. No doubt something so spectacular would be emblazoned on the coinage of the day....... And it got me to thinking. With all the less than miraculous imagery the mint is offering up these days.... Why not embellish us with some astronomical imagery on our current coinage? Heck, it might even serve to get folks interested in space exploration again.
Well, we now have initial flight crews named TODAY for the first Florida-launched manned flights since the Shuttle. Some crews for the Space-X, and some for the Boeing capsule. The end of Soyuz taxi service is coming.
I knew all the physics, optics, perceptual psychology, the works -- and I still found myself getting seriously mentally off-kilter as totality swept in. A total solar eclipse violates way too many principles that have been hard-wired into our biology and psychology since the days when we were single-celled organisms. Fortunately, religion gives us infinite power to explain things. And, of course, infinite compulsion to commemorate them.
Last August was totality number 3 for me. It never gets old, and it never stops getting weird. I have a high quality audio recording I made as totality approached Carbondale, IL. The nature sounds alone are amazing.
And don't forget, the Perseid meteor shower peaks the night of Aug 12-13. Predictions are for a better than average showing AND that shower is generally the greatest one. Take your reclining deck chair out to some dark place. And there will be a new moon so that won't wash out the show. Start by looking east and about halfway up, and as the night goes by it will slowly shift around to the north. And beg whomever you do that to for clear skies. I live in the Wash, DC, area so for me light pollution is a major problem.
Anyone have any astronomical coins to show? I know there are several which show meteors, comets, and eclipses.
I'm an amateur astronomer: I have a 4.5 inch Newtonian telescope, and a 6 inch schmidt-cassegrain telescope (pictured below). And I love ancient coins. Here is one with two stars on the reverse above the she-wolf suckling Romulus and Remus Oh, and I collect fossils too, because one can't contemplate the vastness of the universe and the incomprehensibly vast mounts of time it's been here for without also being drawn (even if just a little) into the wonders of life here on Earth, and the amazing creatures that ruled our world hundreds of millions of years ago.
As the expression goes: "The universe is not only stranger than we imagine, it is stranger than we CAN imagine."
I think classic cars and coins are a good combo.Maybe we could do a classic car quarter series by 2060.
