Daughter of the Stars:
3:30 p.m.

 

The Shawnee Indians of our own country called this group of stars [Corona Borealis] the “Celestial Sisters,” and have an interesting legend respecting it, but lack of space does not permit of its inclusion here.

 

Olcott’s Field Book of the Skies, revised by R. Newton and Margaret W. Mayall

 

The Shawnee Indians knew it [Corona Borealis] as the Celestial Sisters, the fairest of them being the wife of the hunter White Hawk, our Arcturus.

 

Star Names: Their Lore and Meaning, by Richard Hinkley Allen

  We shall have to make up our minds precisely where we stand on the inherent nobility of the Indian, because the problem willl arise later when we least anticipate it. To be specific: some ninety percent of American college and university students in 1976 will believe without question, and will vote in accordance with that belief, that the Indians who roamed the west in 1776 had solved all problems of group living and had attained the ecological balance that ought to exist between man and his environment.  

James A. Michener (1907–1997), Centennial (1974), Chapter 4, p. 168

Book by Jon U. Bell, graphics by by Joe Tucciarone, produced by Joe Hopkins Engineering.

Running time is only 30 minutes, leaving plenty of time for the sky tonight and the objects mentioned in the show. Once I kept the stars off until the Milky Way segment (line 381). By this time, the audience’s eyes were used to the dark, and the effect was overwhelming.

Setup

  1. DVD: Daughter.
  2. Zeiss: north in front, latitude 50° N, positioned to point out
    1. Pleiades, RA 3h 47m
    2. Corona Borealis, RA 16h
    3. Arcturus, RA 14h 16m
    4. Mizar in Ursa Major, RA 13h 24m
  3. Spice computer: DVD-DOTS.CUE (not DOTS.CUE).
  4. Slew (projector R): when line 38 is highlighted, put woven basket in front of and above woman.
  5. Zoom: not used.
  6. Audience enters when 46 RUN is higlighted.
  7. Audience entry sequence.

Setup

The show is about native American stories about the sky. Ask why people tell stories: to teach a lesson, to remember events during the year, …

The show

Press DVD PLAY/PAUSE twice to start show. Line numbers in DVD-DOTS.CUE:

  1. Fade up stars with slow diurnal motion when blue sky fades.
  2. Iroquois: Sun and Moon
  3. Kutenai: We must have a sun
  4. Bella Coola: The Sun and his dancers. Summer and winter solstice suns: lines 130–134.
  5. Snake Indians: Stealing fire from the Moon
  6. Many tribes: the Moon
  7. Onandaga: Legend of Indian Summer. “There you can see them still”: point out the Pleiades.
  8. Algonquin: the flight of Waupee. The Shawnee legend of Corona Borealis; White Hawk is Arcturus in Boötes. Slew the basket manually at the following lines.
  9. Seneca: Thunderer. Strobed lightening (SwitchPulse 0.1 SWCH: F) in lines 295 and 302. Fade down stars and make it rain. Fade stars back up when rainbow fades down.
  10. Creek: Serpent Rainbow
  11. Mayan: Ix-chel
  12. Mohawk: the great hunt for Ursa Major: Mizar and Alcor in the Big Dipper. Point out Big Dipper at “Without hesitation they followed him.” Point out Alcor at “If you look closely you can see the small hunting dog.”
  13. Alabama: Sky Canoes. The “star that never moves” is Polaris.
  14. Many tribes: the Milky Way. Turn Zeiss stars on here (with slow diurnal motion) and leave them on.
  15. Aztec: return of the feathered serpent
  16. Dawn: fade down stars. The campfire burns out.