A4 • Friday, January 18, 2019 | Seaside Signal | SeasideSignal.com
Friday, January 18, 2019 | Seaside Signal | SeasideSignal.com • A4
SignalViewpoints
Q&A with astronomer James Young
SEEN FROM SEASIDE
R.J. MARX
J
ames Whitney Young was born in Port-
land 1941. He is an American astrono-
mer who worked in the fi eld of asteroid
research. After nearly 47 years with the Jet
Propulsion Laboratory at their Table Moun-
tain Facility, Young retired in 2009 as the
resident astronomer of the Jet Propulsion
Laboratory’s Table Mountain Observatory
near Wrightwood, California. Young was
the lead technical guide at the NASA exhibit
of the Seattle World’s Fair during 1962. It
was there he was encouraged to apply for
an “assistant observer” and “darkroom tech-
nician” position at the recently developed
Table Mountain Observatory.
With the advent of powerful lasers,
Young became involved with several proj-
ects that aimed lasers successfully, fi rst at
the Surveyor VII spacecraft on the moon in
1968, later as two laser ranging programs
developed at JPL in the 1990s found their
marks on low and high earth orbiting satel-
lites, as well as the Galileo spacecraft some
6 million kilometers from the earth.
In 2003 Young accepted a new responsi-
bility as “astronomy team leader” where he
maintained the optical performance of the
telescopes and cameras, a position he held
until his retirement.
His main focus was before retirement was
the discovery, recovery and confi rmation of
newly discovered asteroids and comets. He
is credited with more than 250 asteroid dis-
coveries, including two near-earth asteroids.
  
Q: How long have you been coming to
Seaside?
Young: My grandfather was an attor-
ney in Portland and he liked to vacation on
the beach. He built a house here on South
Prom in 1943. I’ve been here almost every
year. My wife Karen and I now have a house
on Ninth Street. She’s also interested in
astronomy.
Q: How did you get interested in the
fi eld?
Young: Bob and Hazel Sealy lived on
Ocean Vista Drive. My brother and I met
them in 1958. He (Sealy) had a telescope.
Although I was already into astronomy, he
was a key ingredient in my establishing my
astronomy career. We started the Seaside
Amateur Astronomers group.
Q: Is the North Coast a good place for
astronomy?
Young: No, it’s a horrible place. It’s the
moisture and clouds. You need clear skies
without moisture. Humidity is terrible. You
will fi nd that observatories around the world
are located in high elevations, away from
light pollution and at dry facilities. We did
astronomy here when we had the chance
because it was fun!
Q: Did you study science in college?
Young: I went to school, but I didn’t
fi nish.
My dad had gotten me a job at the bank,
which I wasn’t interested in, but it was a job.
Then along came the Seattle World’s Fair in
1962. I got a job offer as the lead guide at
the Seattle World’s Fair NASA Exhibit and
Longtime Seasider James Young.
took the job offer at 21.
Q: That was huge!
Young: I quit the bank job and my dad
was pretty mad with me. He said, “You
know, in six months when the fair is over,
you’re through.”
I became the lead guide for the astron-
omy exhibit because of my astronomy back-
ground. We had 32 guides and I taught them
astronomy. Ten million people went through
that exhibit in six months. We had NASA,
astronauts, a cosmonaut from Russia came
through. John Glenn was there. It was a big
thing — it was so inspiring to be able to do
that and continue to learn.
Q: How did you get the job with the Jet
Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena?
Young: One of the gentlemen who came
through the exhibit was (senior engineer)
Tom Bickler from JPL who said: “By the
way, we’re building an observatory. Why
don’t you apply for a job?”
Q: You were only in your 20s. What dis-
tinguished you from other candidates?
Young: They fl ew me down for an inter-
view. The day of my interview I was picked
up and taken to the observatory on a VIP
tour: the laboratory director, his wife and
quite a few of the mucky mucks — the
high-falutin’ people.
I was green behind the ears but I knew
astronomy.
When it got dark that evening, they
turned the telescope on, we started view-
ing, and it broke. Nobody knew what to do. I
said, “Have you got a toolbox?”
In 30 minutes I had the telescope running
again. I was hired without an interview.
Q: What was your job?
I was hired as a darkroom technician. To
be a little technical we did synoptic patrols
of Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn by taking
spectroscopic plates — photographs — of
these planets to investigate their cloud cov-
ers in different wavelengths of light.
We observed comets and asteroids. We
had star parties. It was an outreach for the
community. One thing led to another, and we
eventually got a bigger telescope. I started
doing real science with an astronomer at JPL
and things started rolling.
Q: UFOs — is there any evidence?
Young: It came up with me once, when
I was pretty young. I’m not saying yay or
nay … I have no evidence, but when you see
something that you can’t really account for
in normal things, you call it an unidentifi ed
fl ying object.
However, my feeling is little green mon-
sters that are sticky with one eye — I’m
sorry, that doesn’t fl y with me.
Q: But there was something going on?
Young: I was just standing outside the
observatory one night when I saw something
go by too fast, too high, too odd-shaped to
make any other sense. We never found out
James Young
Rare shooting of a bright fi reball during the Leonid meteor shower, Nov. 17, 1966.
what it was.
Q: You are known for identifying aster-
oids. What’s the difference between an aster-
oid and a planet?
Young: Asteroids are relatively small.
Planets are pretty good size. An asteroid is
relatively small. Most of them are found
between Mars and Jupiter as they rotate the
sun. They are little pieces of material that
can be 20, 40 or 80 miles in diameter or
smaller. They have permanent orbits. I’ve
discovered a lot of them.
Q: Are they barren objects?
Young: That’s right. Rock of some sort,
maybe ice, Some metals. Mining asteroids
might be a feasible thing to do.
Q: Harnessing them? Aren’t they mov-
ing fast?
Young: So are we. We’re going 66,000
mph around the sun. We’ve already had sev-
eral spacecraft go to asteroids. They’ve gone
to comets.
Q: Could an asteroid come into our
atmosphere?
Young: It could, if it came close to earth.
There are about 1,600 near-earth asteroids
that have a potential to get pretty close to the
earth.
Q: Are we at risk?
Young: It would take a fairly big asteroid
to destroy the earth.
We think the earth was hit by an aster-
oid 65 million years ago, which demised the
dinosaurs.
That’s a pretty reasonable theory. It is a
theory, not a fact.
Back in 2010 an extremely small asteroid
hit the earth and we found evidence of that.
But something a mile in diameter hitting the
earth would create serious problems.
Q: Are people concerned about that?
Young: Some are. I’m not.
Q: Why not?
Young: You’re going to get hit by light-
ning 1,000 times before an asteroid is going
to hit the earth. You don’t need to worry
about it. It’s a waste of time.
When you drive out of this driveway,
you’re going to get hit by a car before you
are hit by an asteroid.
Q: When did you get serious about land-
scape photography?
Young: I got my start is back in about
1980. I ran into some New York-based pho-
tographers down in Cannon Beach. I learned
a lot from them in the span of the Christ-
A chance encounter on the Prom
F
eeling somewhat stressed
and worn out as an old mop,
I booked myself a facial with
Kristi Carson, a massage therapist
and facialist working at Seaside Mas-
sage and Spa. Kristi and I met when I
came to interview Alishia Ryan who
owns the place. We had an immediate
rapport; when she told me she loves
doing facials, I made a mental note to
follow up.
I signed up for the spa’s Mermaiden
Signature Facial which includes a
complete assessment of the skin, fol-
lowed by a custom treatment directed
to achieve optimum radiance. The
facial included quite a bit of massage
— arms, shoulders, décolleté — and
it was very soothing and relaxing and
wonderful for the complexion. Kristi
primarily used products the spa sells,
most particularly Essance Skincare, a
Portland-made brand created by Jas-
mine Tran, made from natural ingre-
dients and essential oils. Kristi also
slathered my face with some rare kind
of honey, yes, honey, the kind you eat,
and I think that was my favorite part,
aside, of course, from her light but
decisive touch. At one point she asked
if I was up for some extractions and I
immediately said yes. She also offers
a Mermaizing mini facial; back facials
PUBLISHER
EDITOR
Kari Borgen
R.J. Marx
VIEW FROM
THE PORCH
EVE MARX
‘I HOPE TO SEE YOU
AGAIN ON THE PROM
SOMETIME, NICKY OR
NICOLE.’
that exfoliate and remove blackheads,
as well as facials for men. The men’s
executive facial is a relaxing steam
and cleansing treatment. To book your
appointment, call or text 971-320-
0624, or log on to www.bookseaside-
massage.com/facials.
The week between Christmas and
New Year’s, I took a lot of walks.
The young dog and I were both get-
ting fat from an abundance of holi-
day food. We walked in the Cove and
on the Prom; one day while we were
walking, we met a New York City
dog. It was a small dog, attached to a
30-something woman who told me she
and her husband live in Manhattan on
Eleventh Street. I was dumbfounded.
This is not something that happens to
CIRCULATION
MANAGER
PRODUCTION
MANAGER
Jeremy Feldman
John D. Bruijn
ADVERTISING
SALES
SYSTEMS
MANAGER
April Olsen
Carl Earl
CLASSIFIED
SALES
Danielle Fisher
me every day.
I told her once upon a time I lived
in the city only a few blocks from
where she lived. I told her I’d lived on
Cornelia Street in Greenwich Village
and we discussed all the not-so-won-
derful changes to that part of the
city including the recent closing of
a famous place called The Cornelia
Street Café, popular for 41 years. She
said prior to moving to 11th Street,
she’d also lived on Cornelia.
“I loved that street. It was such
a neighborhood. I should have just
stayed there,” she said.
She said she’d be in town for
another week, but I knew odds were
slim we’d cross paths. She said her
husband is from Portland and his fam-
ily, who mainly live in Portland, have
a place in Seaside.
Despite an approximate 30 year
difference in our ages, I really liked
her and her dog. She said her name is
Nicky or Nicole and she told me her
last name, which I sadly forgot. Mean-
while, maybe someone in her hus-
band’s family is reading this and will
pass it on.
I hope to see you again on the Prom
sometime, Nicky or Nicole.
And that might happen, because
you never know.
STAFF WRITER
Brenna Visser
CONTRIBUTING
WRITERS
Skyler Archibald
Eve Marx
Esther Moberg
Jon Rahl
mas holidays: how to shoot sunset photog-
raphy, the waves. That gave me a boost. I
was doing astronomy, then I realized I could
really move into this.
Q: Your photos of the lighthouse, Terrible
Tilly, off the coast are incredible. How long
have you been shooting there?
Young: Close to 40 years. Every time I’m
up here, when I hear the waves at night, I
know the winds are coming, I know it’s the
back side. If the road is open I go to Ecola
State Park.
Q: Can you get closer?
Young: Hikers can. You can drive to
Indian Beach walk up the trail, which is a
mile and a half. You’re a quarter-mile closer
and looking down. I’m 77 and it’s getting a
little hard to hike that, and if you’re lugging
a big lens, a 13-pound lens, tripod. The last
time I was up there was two years ago.
Q: Are you a student of Terrible Tilly?
Young: A couple of years ago I took the
Ironwood boat out of Tongue Point. We
went around the lighthouse four times for
the event with people from Oregon Public
Broadcasting. I know the owner, Mimi Mor-
rissette. I was allowed to be one of the pho-
tographers to help document the event. I’ve
fl own over in a helicopter, and later fl own in
a plane with the door off of it so I could do
photography in 2015.
Q: Do you continue to use telescopes
here?
Young: I do astronomy here when I can.
We looked at a comet when we fi rst got here
early in December. Last summer I brought
both my trackers so both my wife and I
could do astronomy here. We did quite a
bit of it this past summer. If we get a clear
sky, we go down to south of Tolovana Park
where there’s a big turnout on the highway.
It’s not bad.
We set up our trackers there in the middle
of the night — and we do good photography.
We normally do our best photography at
Big Bend National Park in Texas, because
it’s further south, really dark, and higher
elevation.
If we can add everything — no humid-
ity, no lights, no elevation — then we get our
best images.
Q: Do you have any secrets to share?
Young: Most of the best pictures aren’t
planned hours or days in advance. You have
to be there at the right time — and guess
what: “Click!”
PUBLIC MEETINGS
TUESDAY, Jan. 22
Seaside Airport Advisory Committee, 6 p.m., City Hall, 989
Broadway.
MONDAY, Jan. 28
Seaside City Council, 7 p.m., City Hall, 989 Broadway.
TUESDAY, Jan. 29
Gearhart Town Hall, 7 p.m., meeting on location of new fi re sta-
tion, Gearhart Fire Hall, 670 Pacifi c Way.
TUESDAY, Feb. 5
Seaside Community Center Commission, 10 a.m., Bob
Chisholm Community Center, 1225 Avenue A.
Seaside Library Board, 4:30 p.m., Seaside Public Library, 1131
Broadway.
Seaside Planning Commission, 7 p.m., City Hall, 989 Broadway.
WEDNESDAY, Feb. 6
Gearhart City Council, 7 p.m., City Hall, 698 Pacifi c Way.
THURSDAY, Feb. 7
Seaside Parks Advisory Committee, 7 p.m., City Hall, 989 Broad-
way
MONDAY, Feb. 11
Seaside City Council, 7 p.m., City Hall, 989 Broadway.
WEDNESDAY, Feb. 13
Seaside Convention Center Commission, 5 p.m., Seaside Civic
and Convention Center, 415 First. Ave.
Seaside Signal
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