Welcome to the St. John's College Observatory, Planetarium, and Foucault Pendulum Website.
Special announcement: With regret, the SJC Observatory, Planetarium, and Foucault Pendulum are currently not available to the wider community because of the ongoing Pandemic. We will return to normal availability as described below as soon as conditions permit.
St. John's College maintains the SJC Observatory, the McKeldin Planetarium, and a SJC Foucault Pendulum on the Annapolis campus for use by members of the College community in conjunction with the laboratory and mathematics tutorials. In addition, students are encouraged to work on special projects using the telescopes.
Regular, informal stargazing sessions are held after seminars on Monday and Thursday evenings. Both facilities are also open to the public as astronomical events and activities of general interest arise. Please call the observatory at 410 626 2888 or contact us via email at: stars@sjc.edu for further information.
The St. John's College Observatory was constructed in part with funds obtained from the National Science Foundation's Instrumentation and Laboratory Improvement (ILI) Program. The College gratefully acknowledges NSF's generous support for this and other projects.
The College is also grateful to Meade Instruments for advice and assistance for various repairs of the 12" Meade Schmidt Cassegrain (LX 200) telescope in the Observatory, and for the invaluable assistance of Tim Prowten, who donated a replacement hand controller for the LX-200.