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by the Director General of Universities and Research to ‘study matters relating to astronomy and astrophysics’. Also attending the meeting were three
professors of astronomy (Torroja, Orús, and Cid), and Padre Romañá,
President of the Alfonso X Board of CSIC. I took the opportunity to outline
and defend my conception of how we should organize ourselves, both nationally and in the Canaries, in order to derive the fullest benefit from the new
means of astronomical observing that continued to arrive in Spain.
My ideas clashed with the way of thinking of the others. Their conception,
which was both archaic and centrist, revolved around a main national centre
that would control all activity in this field: a ‘National Institute of Astronomy’.
In that scheme, our Teide Observatory would be simply an observing outpost,
all data obtained being exploited in Madrid. It was exactly what the foreign
Fig. 7.1 Poster for the 1975 ‘I Assembly of Astronomy and Astrophysics’.
(Credit: IAC)
F. Sánchez
by the Director General of Universities and Research to ‘study matters relating to astronomy and astrophysics’. Also attending the meeting were three
professors of astronomy (Torroja, Orús, and Cid), and Padre Romañá,
President of the Alfonso X Board of CSIC. I took the opportunity to outline
and defend my conception of how we should organize ourselves, both nationally and in the Canaries, in order to derive the fullest benefit from the new
means of astronomical observing that continued to arrive in Spain.
My ideas clashed with the way of thinking of the others. Their conception,
which was both archaic and centrist, revolved around a main national centre
that would control all activity in this field: a ‘National Institute of Astronomy’.
In that scheme, our Teide Observatory would be simply an observing outpost,
all data obtained being exploited in Madrid. It was exactly what the foreign
Fig. 7.1 Poster for the 1975 ‘I Assembly of Astronomy and Astrophysics’.
(Credit: IAC)
F. Sánchez