The total eclipse of 2017 is being popularly called the “Great American Eclipse”. Rightfully so, the eclipse is only next to the total solar eclipse that swept the entire landmass of the country on July 29th 1878.

Totality is expected from the west coast state of Oregon, into Idaho, Wyoming, Nebraska, all the way to South Carolina on the eastern coast of the United States. This eclipse already causing a lot of buzz in the astronomical community. Astronomers and enthusiasts are planning exotic experiments they can do during the eclipse. Most normal humans are traveling to the totality belt just to enjoy the celestial show. But, if you are reading this, you probably know normal is too mainstream anyway.

The eclipse of 1878 generated a lot of excitement too, drawing the attention of celebrities like Thomas Edison and physician/astronomer Henry Draper. Draper and Edison set up base camp in in Rawlings, Wyoming to observe the eclipse. Edison brought his invention called a “tasimeter”, a device he envisioned would be used to measure infrared radiation emitted by the sun’s corona. Already amateur and professional astronomers around the world are planning experiments. From spectrography, to photographing the corona, to measure gravitational lensing just like Arthur Eddington’s famous experiment that proved Einstein’s theory of general relativity.

Or even you you find yourself scientifically challenged, it is a memorable event that happens only a few times in a lifetime. In the this author’s humble opinion it is the most dreamy sight you’ve ever seen in your life.

Preliminaries

Fred Espenak’s Eclipse Circumstances Page

This page is a project page stub. If you’d like to contribute or let the world know about your eclipse plan, send me an email at vidur_itm [at] yahoo [dot] com