SHOOTING STARS: The current issue of Discover...

SHOOTING STARS: The current issue of Discover magazine pays homage to Orange County Astronomers, the largest group of amateurs in the nation. With 600 members and an observatory near Mt. Palomar, the club has provided the magazine with spectacular color photographs of a comet, a solar prominence and several nebulae. . . . “As professional astronomers produce fewer and fewer pictures, amateurs are increasingly turning out stunning ones,” says the article. It calls the club’s 22-inch telescope “an amateur astronomer’s dream.”