Background detail about the real-life S.E.T.I. project.
Pictures from [Future's End] unless otherwise stated.
Overcome with excitement at the great significance of her discovery, Rain also e-mails a friend at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) who contacts his professor at the California Institute of Technology (CalTech) (Map 5). Starling takes quick action to suppress Rain Robinson's discovery. He officially rejects her findings and even sends his Security Chief, named Dunbar, secretly to collect the data from Rain's lab and, as he views her as a liability, calling her a "little brat", to murder her. She is, however, rescued by Tuvok and Paris after they visit Rain's laboratory to try to discover how much the native population knows about Voyager and to suppress the knowledge if possible.
Paris and Tuvok enter the Observatory via the Lawn. The Lawn is the best place from which to view the famous Hollywood Sign (see screenshot later or now).
above 2 pictures: Paris and Tuvok drive up to and park at Griffith Observatory, [Future's End]
Looking across the Lawn at the Observatory there are three large copper domes. The one on the right (west) houses the triple-beam solar telescope; the one on the left (east) houses the 12-inch Zeiss Refracting Telescope; the largest dome (in the centre) houses the Planetarium theater. The cupola (front centre) holds the pendulum over the Main Rotunda. Access to the roof and the Refracting Telescope is by way of the stairway on either side of the building. The architecture style of the building is Art Deco, which was the latest vogue at the time of the construction in 1933-1935. On the west edge of the lawn is a memorial to James Dean in the form of a bronze bust (parts of Rebel Without a Cause were filmed at the Observatory).
Paris and Tuvok arrive at Griffith Observatory, [Future's End]
the Hollywood sign, [Future's End]
Newton, [#34 Death Wish]
Paris and Tuvok leave the truck they have "borrowed" from the vehicle dealership (they intend to return it but later circumstances mean that this is impossible, as it is destroyed) parked as close as possible to the main entrance, and walk across the Lawn path past the Astronomers Monument. This monument consists of six statues and honours six of the greatest astronomers of all time. They are Hipparchus (c.160-125 B.C.), Copernicus (1473-1543), Galileo (1564-1642), Kepler (1571-1630), Newton (1642-1727), and Herschel (1738-1822). Sir Isaac Newton is seen in [TNG: Descent] and [#34 Death Wish].
above 6 pictures: astronomers of the Astronomers Monument, source GO
above 2 pictures: first sight of the Astronomers Monument in [Future's End]; two unknown visitors walk past it
The construction of the Astronomers Monument came about as follows. During the economic depression in the 1930s, President F.D. Roosevelt's administration created federally funded work programmes to employ skilled workers in many fields at a time when they would otherwise remain idle and without income. One of the first of these "alphabet" programmes was the PWAP, not the sound of Dunbar's phaser when he fires at Tuvok but Public Works of Art Project, approved to run for six months starting in December 1933. Merle Armitage was the PWAP regional director in Southern California and sought projects to build on public land to employ as many artists as possible. Glendale sculptor Arnold Foerster proposed an astronomical monument at Griffith Observatory. Archibald Garner won the contest for the monument's design, and it was erected. The only "signature" on the Astronomers Monument is "PWAP 1934" referring to how the monument was funded. Garner's design comprises a 37 foot tall tapered shaft (a 6-pointed star in cross-section) rising from a 25 foot wide star shaped base and topped off with a stylised armillary sphere intended to symbolise the Universe. The recesses of the shaft were to each feature 9-foot tall concrete statues of six scientists who laid the foundations of our modern understanding of the cosmos. The tribute was narrowed to only six such persons, omitting Tycho Brahe and Albert Einstein. On 25th November 1934, about 6 months before the opening of Griffith Observatory, a celebration took place to mark the completion of the Astronomers Monument, which had proven to be the most ambitious creation of the PWAP.
Since then the original bare concrete of the monument was covered with white paint as part of Griffith Observatory's remodelling in 1960, and a plaque honouring the 500th anniversary of Copernicus' birth was attached to the lower part of the shaft in 1973.
Near the Monument a radio antenna (shown right, and see also one of the screenshots above) receives signals from weather satellites for display in the Museum (a.k.a. the Hall of Science).
At the base of the Monument is the sundial, a commemoration of the fact that the fundamental units of time are set by the cycles in the sky, which people have been measuring them since prehistoric time; an Egyptian sundial ("gnomon") from 1500 B.C. still exists. A sundial is a models of the apparent movement of the sun, and charts the progress of the sun across the sky during the day, assuming the weather is such that the sun can cast a shadow.
[Future's End]
The sundial here does not work on the first days of spring or autumn - as the sun crosses the celestial equator, the shadow of the thick bar falls on and hides the time scale.
The Lawn and the Astronomers Monument is the scene of the attempted murder of Rain Robinson by Dunbar using a 29th century Federation hand-held subatomic disruptor. When he fires from over by the Astronomers Monument, he misses because Paris spots him in time. Tuvok fires his phaser and fires it again as Dunbar tries once more to hit Rain. But Tuvok manages to hit the weapon out of Dunbar's hand and while Dunbar retrieves it, Paris, Rain and Tuvok drive off in Rain's camper van.
Rain confronts Tuvok, as she is (rightly) convinced that he and Paris wiped her computer's hard disk containing data about the UFO (Voyager), while in the background Dunbar approaches, [Future's End]
Dunbar takes up position by the Astronomers Monument, about to open fire on Rain, [Future's End]
entrance/exit doors of Griffith Observatory, [Future's End]
Tuvok and Paris exit the Observatory, [Future's End]
sign by the doors, which gives details about the Planetarium shows, [Future's End]
As well as her S.E.T.I. duties, Rain "does" the Planetarium show once a week, probably meaning that she helps to present it. She tells Tuvok and Paris, though she is really interested in Paris rather than Tuvok: "Hey, I do the planetarium show Tuesday nights, so er, you guys should come by, check it out, bring your friends. 'The best stars in Hollywood are right above us.'"
Rain exits the Observatory in pursuit of Tuvok and Paris, [Future's End]
The Hall of Science constitutes the astronomy museum. This is not seen in [Future's End], although the museum tour is mentioned. Rain Robinson, as an astronomer at the Observatory, knows the museum well. In order to reach the lobby, i.e. the main entrance hall, from Room 123, the laboratory in which Rain Robinson works, go right down the hall, take a left at the Mars exhibit, turn right at the Halley's Comet exhibit and then just keep going straight ahead past the soda machine, as per her instructions to Paris and Tuvok when they claim to have got lost during the museum tour. The following is a brief description of certain museum exhibits, which would be well-known to Rain.
EXHIBITS INFORMATION. SHOW NOTES.
The Main Rotunda features the Foucault Pendulum. The pendulum demonstrates that the earth rotates. The brass ball, which weights 240 lbs, hangs by a wire 40 feet long, and swings in a constant direction while the Earth turns beneath it. The pendulum is supported by a bearing that does not turn the pendulum as the building rotates with the Earth. A ring magnet at the bearing gives a little tug on each swing of the pendulum to keep the pendulum in motion. It is set up by the staff each morning and runs all day. It slowly comes to a stop after the power is turned off at night.
Upon the high ceiling are the Hugo Ballin Murals, completed in 1934. In imitation of medieval cathedrals and abbeys which tell biblical and other stories in stone, carvings and paint, these murals tell the story of science in paint. On the ceiling are depicted Atlas, the four Winds, and the signs of the Zodiac, plus the planets as mythological gods, and a comet. The eight rectangular panels show highlights of astronomy, aeronautics, navigation, civil engineering, metallurgy and electricity, time, geology and biology, and mathematics and physics.
schematic of the gravity well, a.k.a. gravity sinkhole, on Voyager's Astrometrics Lab viewscreen, [#107 Gravity]
Skylab, artwork, from my personal collection
The South Gallery is located between the Main Rotunda and the entrance to the Planetarium theatre. The general theme is planets.
The Gravity Well exhibit's parabolic shape reproduces the gravitational effect which the sun has on the planets (or a planet on its moons). The well has a steeper curvature ("stronger gravity") near the centre, and this causes objects to speed up as they approach the centre. They move faster because space has a greater curvature. Friction with the surface causes the steel balls to slow down and eventually to fall in, which illustrates the fact that in space there is so little friction that the planets do not move significantly closer to the sun during the lifetime of the solar system. A satellite in low earth orbit feels friction with the upper atmosphere and eventually spirals to the ground, as Skylab did in 1979.
Tuvok and Paris are trapped together, along with an alien female named Noss, in a gravity well in [#107 Gravity], another episode in which, like [Future's End], these two men work together.
The nearby Orrery, a mechanical one, is a device that shows the planets in motion around the sun, and this one includes the moon. It also shows the Earth's inclination. Visitors can weigh themselves on planet scales, which show a visitor's weight on the Earth, Moon, Mars and Jupiter. One's weight depends not only upon the mass of the planet on one is standing but also on its size. On small worlds, one is closer to the centre of mass, which is why the Sun, with 333,000 times the mass of the Earth, has only 28 times the surface gravity, i.e. if the sun's mass was to be compressed into a sphere the size of the Earth when one stood on it one would weigh 333,000 times as much as on Earth.
Apollo 11 moon mission tribute, artwork
Hubble Space Telescope, artwork
2 pictures above: from my personal collection
The East Hall contains, among other exhibits, the Moon Alcove displaying pictures of highlights of the Apollo missions to the Moon which took place 1969-1972. The Geochron is a clock which shows the current time everywhere on Earth, and the sunrise and sunset lines. There are displays showing current weather pictures of the Earth and comparing this with cloud patterns on Venus and Mars. The Moon Globe is a 6-foot model which shows the entire surface of the Moon; few craters have formed since four/three billion years ago as there is hardly any erosion because there is no air. The 1/5th scale model of the Hubble Space Telescope is surrounded by some of the spectacular photographs it has taken; several of its photographs appear from time to time on monitor displays in Voyager's Astrometrics Laboratory, e.g. the Eagle Nebula and Cat's Eye Nebula (details and screenshots in the PERSONAL LOG entry for [#82 Message In A Bottle]). There is a Camera Obscura ("camera obscura" is Latin for "dark chamber"), in which a large convex lens focuses light from outside the building onto the viewing screen; the image would be upside down, but an overhead mirror turns it right-side-up again, and this demonstrates how a lens focuses light to make an image. Renaissance artists including Leonardo Da Vinci, Janeway's childhood hero of whom she programs hologram not long after the events of [Future's End], used similar devices to make accurate sketches of distant scenes. The Seismograph records vibrations from the floor and displays the readings. There is a seismograph in the basement (not accessible to the public).
The East Rotunda contains the 6-foot hand-painted Earth Globe which shows physical topography at the scale 106 miles to the inch (70 km/cm) with a variable vertical exaggeration of about 12 times. The globe is tilted so that its axis of rotation is aligned with the true axis of the Earth, which means the best view of the northern hemisphere is from the north side, and the southern from the south. The Meteorite Exhibit contains samples of material that fell to Earth, being fragments of minor planets that formed and then shattered in mutual collisions millions or billions of years ago. A few contain pieces of the original material out of which the planets formed. Some (the iron meteorites) came from the interiors of small planets, while others (the stony) are the mantles and crusts of others. Meteorites are the oldest objects one can ever touch.
In the West Hall are a Tesla Coil, built in the 1920s, which is a transformer which increases the electrical voltage up to about half a million volts. It is the high voltage that causes the electricity to jump so far. The sparks are like short lightning bolts and the sound is like miniature thunder. The Tesla Coil was invented by the eccentric Nikola Tesla (1856-1943), who displayed his first model in 1891. His largest coil, in 1899, was 200 feet high and sent thick sparks flying 135 feet. The Nature of Light exhibit explains that everything that exists (at least on the planets) is made of the same fundamental elements, and all that we know about the stars comes from analyses of their light, and explains how the chemical elements were created in the Big Bang and in stars. In [#34 Death Wish], a refugee Q tries to hide from Q and the Q Continuum by taking USS Voyager back to the Big Bang.
'Life on Mars?' newspaper cutting on Rain's laboratory wall, complete with microfossil picture and "take me to your leader" caption, [Future's End]
The Mars Exhibit, located in the West Hall, contains a piece of basaltic lava which flowed and then cooled on Mars' surface 1.3 billion years ago, was knocked into space by a meteorite impact 180 million years ago and fell to Earth as a meteorite in 1962. In Rain Robinson's laboratory wall is a newspaper cutting about the very recent 1996 discovery of water on Mars which led to speculation that there may be, or at least may have been, life on Mars. This indicates that the events of [Future's End] occure no earlier than NASA's discovery of possible microfossils in a Martian meteorite. [Future's End] was filmed in August 1996, a few days after NASA's press conference announcing that discovery. To commemorate this, and thereby set the date of [Future's End] in late 1996, the [Voyager] art department put a large photo of the microfossil, with the caption 'take me to your leader', as well as a newspaper clipping describing the finding into Rain Robinson's laboratory. (This information also appears elsewhere in this article.)
The Radio Astronomy exhibit explains how radio telescopes allow Man to see what the universe would look like if human eyes were sensitive to radio waves. The S.E.T.I. project, on which Rain Robinson works, uses radio telescopes. Since circa World War II, all we knew about the universe came from what we could see with our eyes, and all the information we had arrived in the form of visible light, but since then, astronomers have devised ways of seeing the universe in infrared light, gamma rays (Starling has arranged for Rain Robinson to search for a specific gamma emissions frequency profile), X-rays, and other exotic wavelengths. Pulsars, for instance, were discovered with radio telescopes.
The West Rotunda is mainly devoted to exhibits about the Sun, which include information about the Observatory's solar telescopes which in fact are three on one mounting, the whole being called a triple-beam coelostat.
There is a model of the 200-inch Hale Telescope on Palomar Mountain, part of the Palomar Observatory, near San Diego, California, and the central plug from its mirror. The model demonstrates how the 500-ton telescope and 2,000-ton dome turn to point to different parts of the sky. (In [#102 Nothing Human] the Doctor shows his slideshow audience a picture of Paris after he fell into "the fetid mud pits of Pala Mar". I use the spelling used in Encyclopaedia (and hence in TOSTFF) but I suspect that Pala Mar was an in-joke by Andre Bormanis (the show's science consultant and occasional story contributor), named for Palomar and/or the Palomar Observatory, which are bound to be known to Bormanis.)
