Nice report! --- On Sat, 1/15/11, Raeburn Kennard <rkennard@kmclaw.com> wrote:
From: Raeburn Kennard <rkennard@kmclaw.com> Subject: [Utah-astronomy] Book Report on Meteorites To: "utah-astronomy@mailman.xmission.com" <utah-astronomy@mailman.xmission.com> Date: Saturday, January 15, 2011, 4:38 PM I have just finished reading a book I received at Christmas: The Fallen Sky - An Intimate History of Shooting Stars, by Christopher Cokinos, 2009 (Penguin ed. 2010). The book presents an interesting summary of the progress of scientific understanding of meteroites; and, through them, the evolution of scientific understanding of many aspects of astronomy and Earth's place in the cosmos. It uses the literary device of studying the adventures of key meteorite hunters/finders, making the science more interesting because of the historical and human contexts. It relates the stories of Ellis Hughes' "harvest" of the Willamett meteorite, Eliza Kimberly and the Kansas "Brenham Fall," Robert Peary's meteorite finds in Greenland, Daniel Barringer's life-long interest in the Arizona Meteor Crator; and the adventures and competitions of Harvey Ninger and Lincoln LaPaz. Along the way, the author describes his own "pilgrimages" to the sites of each of these stories, and even his own adventures during a season of meteorite hunting in Antarctica. I'm not informed enough to second-guess his representation of the evolving science, but it seemed pretty solid to me. I was less enthusiastic about his personal introspections, but I'll allow him that author's privilege. In summary, I enjoyed the read, and plan to hang onto the book for future reference. It rekindled for me the desire to someday find a meteorite of my own - even if it's a small ugly one. By the way, author is (or was while writing the book) a professor at Utah State University - so there's that local flavor as well. He mentions the on-going search for near eath objects, but misses the opportunity to toot the horn of our own Patrick Wiggins. Patrick, you and Professor C should get acquainted.
Raeburn Kennard
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