Profile: Peter D. Stoycheff

Personal background
Although now retired from the Ohio State University for several years, I was a draftsman for the Dept. of Astronomy for over 26 years. I first worked at the Perkins Observatory in the dark room, where I prepared prints of spectra for "An Atlas of Spectra of the Cooler Stars, Types G,K,M.S, and C" for Dr. Philip C. Keenan. I also labeled the original tables in ink with the names of the stars and their types, suitable for publication.

Another of my jobs at Perkins was to give tours of the Observatory to anyone who would ring the doorbell at 2:00pm each weekday. We would climb the stairs to the dome and look at the 32-inch Schottland Telescope. We would also open the slit and rotate the dome on many occasions. I would explain how the reflector worked and how the refractor worked. Sometimes when it was not a busy day and the tourists desired we would walk back to the OSU Radio Observatory and I would give them an explanation on how the Radio Telescope worked and occasionally we would also be able to see the undergound recording and control room. Of course this is the place where the "WOW" signal was received. The Radio Telescope was run by the Dept. of Physics at Ohio State University, not by the Dept. of Astronomy. The OSU Radio Telescope no longer exists; it was torn down and now is part of a golf course.
Thoughts about SETI and SETI@home
In my adult life I've always thought that other life exists in the universe. The statistics would seem to prove it, but that doesn't mean it is enough for many people. The universe is virtually inconcievably huge. When one considers how many thousands of light-years it takes for light to travel from one edge of our galaxy to the opposite edge, and, when one knows of the other multi-million galaxies scattered through out the universe and the incredible space between them and our solar system--that the place is sooo llaarrggee, that one surely can assume that there has to be some other life in all of that space--that surely we cannot be alone.
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