Climax solar observatory’s history featured in CMC presentation

Leadville campus to host event featuring 1940’s observatory on Oct. 25

The Colorado Mountain College Foundation will host “The Observatory at Climax: Mining the Sun,” a presentation that highlights the history of the Climax solar observatory.

The presentation at CMC Leadville will be given by Dr. Hanna Rose Shell, a University of Colorado Boulder professor at the College of Arts and Sciences who has extensively researched the observatory. Using immersive solar image video projections, Shell’s presentation will detail the story of the ground-breaking solar observatory positioned on top of the Climax molybdenum mine near Leadville in the 1940s.

According to Shell, the observatory was originally a Harvard project in collaboration with Climax. It housed North America’s first coronagraph — a specialized telescope used to study the sun’s gaseous halo. It then became a collaboration between Harvard and the University of Colorado Boulder, based at Climax. In the late 1940s, it became the High Altitude Observatory and its headquarters moved to Boulder, though the observatory continued collecting solar data. By the mid-‘50s, Harvard was no longer involved.

Over time, advances in solar instrumentation, competing observatories, and the shift toward space-based solar observations made the Climax observatory less competitive. The observatory was decommissioned in July 1972.

The evening will be hosted in two Leadville campus buildings. From 5-7 p.m., an immersive solar array video installation projecting rare solar films produced as scientific data by the observatory will be at the campus gym in the Climax Molybdenum Leadership Center. The solar display will help bring the legacy of the observatory together with interwoven histories of mining, astronomy and present-day science, art and culture.

Additionally, Shell’s presentation will be held from 5-6 p.m. in the Pinnacle Learning Commons on campus.

‘Climax: History, Science, Art’

“The kind of project that occurred at Climax in those years brought together so many different kinds of backgrounds, types of expertise and political leanings,” said Shell. “It is an inspiring model for how we can find ways to engage with people from a wide range of stakeholders, with distinctive political ideologies.”

Shell is the author of multiple books and award-winning documentary films. A historian of science and technology, and an artist and curator whose “Climax: History, Science, Art” was exhibited at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder earlier this year.

CMC Leadville is at 901 Highway 24. Attendees may RSVP.  Light refreshments will be provided.