One blustery Saturday this past January, I awoke to darkness. Dragging myself out of bed, it took me a few minutes to remember why my alarm was going off so early. Today was the day I, along with two other Simpson Street Free Press writers would journey down to the Windy City.

Our trip to Chicago would be both recreational and work related. We were going to visit a few of the museums taking part in the citywide “Festival of Maps.”

After arriving at the Simpson Street Free Press office at 7:30 in the morning with chocolate doughnuts in hand, we piled into the Community Car, and headed down the highway towards Chicago. Our first stop on our four-part trip: the world-renowned Alder Planetarium.

The Alder Planetarium proves that a map can be made out of anything. Featured in the exhibit are collections of globes, hand drawings, artifacts, and pictures, some of which are over 500 years old.

For thousands of years, navigators have used the stars to tell direction, time, and fortunes. In 1630, mapmaker Willem Blaeu, created two large, intricate globes. One terrestrial, of the earth, and one celestial, of the stars. The grand celestial globe now finds its home at Alder. Covering the surface of the globe are constellations of stars in the shapes of mythical creatures. This is the first exhibit to hold this magnificent piece due to its size. The exhibit also displays books from the 1600’s with similar mythical drawings of many-headed monsters and beautiful longhaired women.

Maps of the moon are also displayed in the center of the exhibit. In the 19th century, Johann Schmidt created an enormous scale drawing of the moon, featuring over 33,000 craters and hand-drawn on 25 sheets of paper. I was impressed by the enormity of the drawing, but even more so by the detail of each tiny crater, which makes this piece one-of-a-kind.

After viewing the stars and the moon, we saw maps of the entire universe. There are many types of globes: smaller, pocket-sized, brass, and larger stand models, which are used to employ different ideas of what exactly the Universe is. I was impressed by the beautiful craftsmanship of the wooden and brass models because the detailed models were created so long ago.

The second gallery at the planetarium was no less extraordinary. Titled, “From the Night Sky to the Big Bang,” this exhibit used many interactive videos to draw us into the lives of the astronomers like Ptolemy and Copernicus.

Claudius Ptolemy, the famed second century astronomer, mathematician, and geographer believed the Universe was earth-centered. This means the sun, moon, and planets rotated around the Earth. Up until the sixteenth century, everyone in the western world held this same belief. In the 1500’s, Nicolaus Copernicus theorized that the universe was not earth-centered but rather sun-centered, and began creating drawings and models to prove his theory.

As I wandered around the exhibit, I came upon a massive telescope, designed by Alvan Clark in 1864. It had a lens over a foot and a half wide. Another interactive display featured rainbow patterns of sunlight, where we could view the entire visible light spectrum in one booth. The room was darkened, so that we could better see the bright lights in various booths. 

The Alder Planetarium was the first of its kind in the world, opening its doors to the public on May 12, 1930. It features many exciting exhibits like the “Mapping the Universe,” and “From the Night Sky to the Big Bang.” All of the exhibits are fascinating, and all are meant to help visitors get a better view of the vast galaxy surrounding us.

Currently, the Planetarium is one of 30 institutions participating in the “Festival of Maps.” These institutions explore our planet, or other planets, imaginary lands, and space.

The Alder Planetarium is open every day from 9:30 am- 4:30 pm. Visit them online at http://www.adlerplanetarium.org/. Better yet, do what we did, and plan a road trip to Chicago. It’s not very far to go considering you can explore an entire universe.