109
(a) To carry out and promote any kind of astrophysical research or other
research related thereto.
(b) To spread astronomical knowledge, collaborate in university teaching specializing in astronomy and astrophysics in the university district of La
Laguna, and train scientific and technical personnel in all fields related to
astrophysics.
(c) Administer the existing centres, observatories, astronomical and facilities,
and those to be created or incorporated under its administration in the
future, together with any entities dependent on its services.
(d) To foster relations with the national and international scientific
communities.
Those of us working at the Astrofísico in the spring of 1982 celebrated our
newly promulgated law in grand style, with a dinner and much revelry at a
very popular restaurant near the runway of Los Rodeos airport. We were
rather boisterous and, not to put too fine a point on it, we rather overdid it.
Such were our antics and horseplay that the owner of the restaurant told us to
settle our bill and never darken her door again.
The new IAC was established at a high-level meeting of its Governing
Council, attended by the Minister of the Presidency of the Government, the
President of the Canarian Council (this was the title of the Canarian government in that pre-autonomous time), the Chancellor of the University of La
Laguna, the President of CSIC, and the Director of the Institute (an ex oficio
member and Secretary of the Governing Council). The Council met at the
Moncloa, the headquarters of the Presidency of the Government, on 26 July
1982 and began by appointing the Minister of the Presidency of the
Government as Chair and Professor Francisco Sánchez as Director of the IAC.
The new status granted to the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias by this
new law was ill received by the National Geographical Institute, to which the
National Commission of Astronomy, the Spanish part of the German Calar
Alto Observatory (Almeria), and the National Observatory (as the Astronomical
Observatory of Madrid was then called) were all answerable (each of them also
had designs on controlling the Canarian Observatories). CSIC was even less
favourable for the same reasons because it had been given to understand that
the IAC would be just one CSIC-controlled institution more. It was unthinkable that a minor entity like the IAC should have prerogatives and privileges
exceeding those of the all-powerful CSIC, even if only in certain areas. These
feelings of affront, together with the rising star of the IAC within and beyond
our frontiers, generated grudges in many minds against the Institute that have
harmed all involved. We have always been conscious of the permanent
12 Science Meets Politics…
(a) To carry out and promote any kind of astrophysical research or other
research related thereto.
(b) To spread astronomical knowledge, collaborate in university teaching specializing in astronomy and astrophysics in the university district of La
Laguna, and train scientific and technical personnel in all fields related to
astrophysics.
(c) Administer the existing centres, observatories, astronomical and facilities,
and those to be created or incorporated under its administration in the
future, together with any entities dependent on its services.
(d) To foster relations with the national and international scientific
communities.
Those of us working at the Astrofísico in the spring of 1982 celebrated our
newly promulgated law in grand style, with a dinner and much revelry at a
very popular restaurant near the runway of Los Rodeos airport. We were
rather boisterous and, not to put too fine a point on it, we rather overdid it.
Such were our antics and horseplay that the owner of the restaurant told us to
settle our bill and never darken her door again.
The new IAC was established at a high-level meeting of its Governing
Council, attended by the Minister of the Presidency of the Government, the
President of the Canarian Council (this was the title of the Canarian government in that pre-autonomous time), the Chancellor of the University of La
Laguna, the President of CSIC, and the Director of the Institute (an ex oficio
member and Secretary of the Governing Council). The Council met at the
Moncloa, the headquarters of the Presidency of the Government, on 26 July
1982 and began by appointing the Minister of the Presidency of the
Government as Chair and Professor Francisco Sánchez as Director of the IAC.
The new status granted to the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias by this
new law was ill received by the National Geographical Institute, to which the
National Commission of Astronomy, the Spanish part of the German Calar
Alto Observatory (Almeria), and the National Observatory (as the Astronomical
Observatory of Madrid was then called) were all answerable (each of them also
had designs on controlling the Canarian Observatories). CSIC was even less
favourable for the same reasons because it had been given to understand that
the IAC would be just one CSIC-controlled institution more. It was unthinkable that a minor entity like the IAC should have prerogatives and privileges
exceeding those of the all-powerful CSIC, even if only in certain areas. These
feelings of affront, together with the rising star of the IAC within and beyond
our frontiers, generated grudges in many minds against the Institute that have
harmed all involved. We have always been conscious of the permanent
12 Science Meets Politics…