Bill - Focal Point Obituary

Bill Close
1915 - 1994

The Club lost one of its most valued members with the death
of Bill Close on September 9th. Bill and Anna Belle were both
founding members of our Club in 1947. They have been members
continuously since then. Several years ago they were voted
honorary life memberships because of their long history of
service to the Club and to all amateur astronomers in the
Atlanta area.

Bill was born in Atlantic City, New Jersey, eighty-two years
ago. The great depression came along when he was a young man,
and he left his childhood home to seek his fortune. He had many
interesting stories about his adventures on a cross-country
hitch-hiking trip. He eventually found himself in Washington
D.C., where he enrolled in the Corcoran School of Art. During
his art school days he met and married Anna Belle McBath,
daughter of a Presbyterian minister and his wife, both of whom
were missionaries in Guatemala. After their marriage, Bill and
Anna Belle moved to Atlanta, where Bill was a commercial artist
for the Rhodes Furniture Co. In 1940 they bought a house on
Forkner Drive in Decatur, where Bill lived for the rest of his
life.

In 1947 Bill and Anna Belle read a notice in the paper that
an astronomy club was to be formed at Agnes Scott College. Anna
Belle and her father attended that organizational meeting. Bill
joined the next month, and the two of them attended most of the
other the meetings in the Club's forty-seven year history.

Now that he was an official amateur astronomer, Bill needed a
telescope. Telescopes were not easy to come by in those days,
and the only way to get a really good one was to build it
yourself. Bill ground a 6" mirror, and mounted it with a
combination of aluminum and plumbing fittings. It worked, and it
worked well.

Naturally, any amateur astronomer always needs a bigger
telescope, so when Bill heard that a few 16" Pyrex blanks were
to be surplused by the military, he ordered one. At that time, a
16" telescope was very large. It was almost unheard of for an
amateur to build such a large instrument. Bill's adventures with
the construction of his 16" are recounted in his own words in
our lead article this month. The telescope was a fantastic
success. It brought the fascinating world of deep sky observing
to many of us.

Bill was always generous with his time and advice. His
astronomical paintings have appeared as murals on planetarium
walls, and on the front cover of Sky & Telescope. His interest
in telescope building continued through the rest of his life. He
was recently working on an unusual 8" which was to have a novel
focusing arrangement. He served as president of the Atlanta
Astronomy Club, and as chairman of the Southeast Region of the
Astronomical League.

Bill was a resource to all astronomers in the Atlanta area.
With his passing, we have all suffered a great loss. This issue
of the Focal Point is dedicated to Bill's memory.