(4.8) The annual gathering to recognize the unique literary contributions of renowned horror-fantasy writer H. P. Lovecraft takes place Sunday afternoon at the Ladd Observatory. The observatory will be open to visitors starting at 1:30 pm to view the historic scientific instrument collection and tour the building, rain or shine. If the skies are clear there will also be a solar telescope on the front lawn through which one can safely observe the sun. (Facebook event page.) Following these events, participants will be invited to gather at Lovecraft’s grave in Swan Point Cemetery.
The Brown Alumni Magazine writes,
[Lovecraft] grew up on Providence’s East Side, where he frequented the Ladd Observatory, whose director was a family friend. Lovecraft owned three telescopes, through one of which he watched Halley’s comet’s passage in 1910. Starting in the 1890s he chronicled his observations in a series of three-by-four-inch hand-printed journals, to which his family members seem to have subscribed. Several dozen of the volumes survive.
Among Lovecraft’s creations was The Rhode Island Journal of Astronomy, which he reproduced by hectograph, a printing process that uses pans of gelatin to transfer a special ink. The November 1903 issue was headlined “The Ladd Observatory Visited by a Correspondent Last Night.” The correspondent was thirteen.
Free, 1:30pm to 4pm, Sunday, April 8, Ladd Observatory, 210 Doyle Avenue (directions)