Hummel Planetarium
Introduction
Text-to-speech Audio
You take your seat in the theater. Your chair is reclined back at a slight angle, so you can better see the screen arching above your head. The room goes dark, the screen illuminates with a nighttime sky and you forget you’re on EKU’s campus, in the Arnim D. Hummel Planetarium. If it wasn’t for Professor Jack Fletcher’s patience and perseverance, EKU might not have had a planetarium. The planetarium was supposed to be finished in 1979 but shoddy equipment kept it from opening. After years of court battles, EKU finally got the planetarium the working equipment it needed and opened in 1988. Now, Hummel Planetarium is one of the largest and most sophisticated planetariums in the United States, especially on a university campus, and currently seats 194 viewers.
Images
Construction of the Hummel Planetarium, ca. 1978. EKU Photograph Collection.
Construction of the Hummel Planetarium, ca. 1978. EKU Photograph Collection.
Sources
Ellis, William E. 2015. A history of Eastern Kentucky University : the school of opportunity. n.p.: Lexington : The University Press of Kentucky, ©2015.
“Hummel Planetarium ,” Discover EKU, accessed July 25, 2018, https://discovereku.omeka.net/items/show/824.
“Hummel Planetarium ,” Discover EKU, accessed July 25, 2018, https://discovereku.omeka.net/items/show/824.