Abandoned Oak Ridge Observatory - Harvard, MA

My whole life I have been fascinated with outer space. When you picture somebody looking up at the stars and wondering if anyone is out there looking back at them, I'm that guy. Many years of driving to night college were made tolerable by the Coast to Coast AM radio show which, if you don't mind sitting through a fair amount of weirdness, discusses all things related to the universe.

I'm also a fan of anything abandoned, having spent the past several years exploring dozens of places that are forgotten and neglected. It's a rare occasion these two worlds would ever have an opportunity to meet, but that's just what happened when I explored an abandoned observational campus in the woods of Harvard Massachusetts.

Opened in 1933, Oak Ridge once operated the largest optical telescope east of Texas, and is credited with the discovery of 38 minor (dwarf) planets and asteroids within our solar system. Oak Ridge also boasted of an 84-foot radio telescope which was used in Project BETA, their search for extraterrestrial intelligence. More on that one in a bit.

The dome below housed a telescope called the 16" Boller and Chivens Cassegrain reflector. While it is no longer inside, if you visit the the National Air and Space Museum's Public Observatory in Washington, DC, you may get a chance to use that very piece of equipment. What used to operate within this building has been relocated there for public use.

I took the above picture while standing on this cement platform, which once held a pair of open-air scopes called the Damon Patrol Cameras.

The largest building at this complex is this funny cylindrical structure which is home to the massive 61" Wyeth telescope, first installed in 1934 and then upgraded with a Pyrex mirror in 1936. Pyrex is less prone to warping with changes in air temperature than glass, beneficial when the roof was rolled back and the telescope exposed to cold night air. This telescope was operated in partnership with the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory until the complex shut down in 2005.

What I assumed was a small storage shed I later learned was the observatory's darkroom, housed in its own building.

It wasn't just the skies researchers studied at this facility - sometimes they looked down. Below is the seismograph building where the US Geological Survey measured tremors, then by triangulating these tremors with other facilities were able to pinpoint the source of the disturbance.

Walk a little ways into the woods and you'll find a beautiful stone building, where researchers once lived.

Though impressive in its day, as anyone who's ever owned the same cell phone for more than a few years knows, technology moves at a rapid pace. What was once state of the art is now abandoned scraps on a hilltop in Massachusetts. That doesn't mean the university has given up its research, however, they just now operate out of a newer facility at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in nearby Cambridge.

The only piece of equipment I wasn't able to see was the 84 foot radio telescope, which once stood on this platform. After suffering severe damage during a storm over ten years ago it was dismantled and removed. But here comes the fun part of the story, because that dish once played a part in the BETA program operated by SETI. SETI stands for the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence, and BETA was a program run by SETI called the Billion channel Extra-Terrestrial Assay. Essentially, this was once a small piece of a much larger program that to this day continues searching for life in our universe.

Before you go running for the home button on your browser, hear me out. When considering whether life exists outside of Earth there are two distinct groups. One you know of already, the group that classifies any bright light in the sky as a UFO - great for an afternoon of entertainment on YouTube. Then there is the SETI community - legitimate scientists under the assumption that with trillions of stars in our universe, life almost certainly has arisen elsewhere. But they go looking for it in a very different way.

Imagine trying to figure out whether life exists here on Earth, from light years away. One method would be the massive engineering feat of sending spaceships to our planet to have a look; doable but improbable. A much easier method would be to simply sit back and listen. With a strong enough receiver, even from many light years away you'd be able to pick up all sorts of signals "leaking" from our planet, including early television programs and military communications. A big joke among the scientific community is that searchers on a planet 60 light years from us might actually be receiving episodes of I Love Lucy at this very moment. SETI searches the skies for these signals leaking away from other star systems, and although nothing has been found definitively yet, a few signals have given searchers hope. One of those was a reception called the "Wow!" signal, picked up back in the 70's.

Just how much of a nerd am I when it comes to this stuff? I'm writing this while drinking coffee from my SETI mug, something I purchased off the seti.org website over 10 years ago. I've been following them for a long time now, and one of my greatest hopes is that they find a conclusive signal at some point within my lifetime.

Frog Rock, New Boston NH

Although it's happened before, it is a rare occasion when we can entice our youngest daughter to spend an afternoon hiking with us. When you're responsible for answering hundreds of Snapchats on any given day, there just aren't enough hours left over for nuisances such as exercise and fresh air. We'd have to be going somewhere pretty exciting for her to join in, and to invite her on an adventure where our goal is to see a rock? That's the king of suggestion that'll have her pulling out the birth certificate and questioning her family lineage.

This is Frog Rock, and it doesn't take much imagination to understand where it got its name.

But what does take imagination is understanding how a hundred years ago this was a popular destination. Woods now surround the entire area, and the grassy plain visitors once picnicked on is a thing of the past. So, in large part, is the memory of Frog Rock. Although trails will lead you within a couple dozen feet of it, there isn't a single sign or marker indicating the rocks existence. Without knowing what you're looking for, you'd likely walk right past it.

To see the rock requires just a 10 minute hike, beginning at a trailhead along the 2nd NH Turnpike in New Boston. Frog Rock is not the only interesting thing you will see along the way, either. This former road was home to houses and at least one barn, the foundations of which still remain.

Some of the walls were so tall, my wife was able to wander amongst them like a corn maze.

I have come across several Lincoln Log cabins in the woods of New Hampshire, and the majority were abandoned after just a couple of layers. Such is the case below. My conclusion is that most people go into this thinking they can build one with not much more effort than it took as a kid.

Eventually, if you make a right hand turn where you see just the hint of a trail, you will arrive at Frog Rock. Much like our former Old Man of the Mountain, from most directions this will look like just a big old pile of nothing. But get it from the right angle and it suddenly takes the form you are looking for.

Although it only takes a moment to admire and photograph it, we'd already devoted an afternoon to finding it and weren't going to leave without a little fun. One of our group even wondered if giving it a kiss might magically produce for her a dashing young prince. I can't speak for the results any of you might have, but I can confirm that this young lady was quite smitten with who accompanied her out of the woods that afternoon.

To see Frog Rock for yourself, follow the directions given on the New Boston Historical Society's website below. And be sure to look for WeRmudfun's video clip at the bottom of the page for a special guest appearance.

http://www.newbostonhistoricalsociety.com/frogrock.html