Education
The Many “Rooms” of Herman Melville – Analog Beginnings to the Digital Present
The Newberry Library
Call Me Herman: The Life and Writings of Herman Melville is a freely accessible collection of reference databases related to the life and writings of the 19th century American author, Herman Melville. After spending a mere 11 years writing and publishing a series of travel narratives and novels that culminated in the rhetorical, philosophical, and literary masterpiece that is Moby-Dick, Melville spent the last 35 years of his life writing and publishing poetry. Besides the four volumes of poetry he successfully saw through to publication — Battle-Pieces, Clarel, John Marr and Other Sailors, and Timoleon — at the time of his death he was still composing, revising, and arranging for publication three other verse-inspired or verse-filled volumes which he unfortunately did not live long enough to complete and publish: Billy Budd, Sailor; Weeds and Wildings Chiefly with a Rose or Two; and Parthenope.
Like any website, Call Me Herman is a work-in-progress, but even in its current, inchoate state, exploring its menus, submenus, and site map will provide visitors with a detailed overview of the entire corpus of Melville’s writings—published and unpublished, completed and uncompleted. The various databases include book and subject bibliographies sorted by author and year; a Melville Almanac that highlights important dates in Melville’s life; various annotated resource lists; an extensive selection of quotations; a gallery of art works that Melville saw, collected, or wrote about; and categorized listings of current and out of print books of Melville biography, criticism, and editions.
In addition to these archival resources, you will also find a calendar of upcoming events and links to Melville-related websites, blogs, and newsfeeds. The event calendar, links to various websites, blogs, and groups, and the constantly changing content of the newsfeeds indicate the extent to which Melville continues to attract, influence, and inspire readers, writers, scholars, visual artistis, critics, musicians, actors, and playwrights. A planned archive of cartoons and advertising copy will document Melville’s continuing influence on popular culture.
The Original Melville Room
Much as this website evolved out of a need for handy reference material, in the pre-internet decades of the 1960s, ’70s, and ’80s, a similar need led to the establishment of what was to become the original Melville Room that was curated and housed on the second floor of Chicago’s Newberry Library. In the mid-1960s, the late Professor Harrison Hayford (1916–2001) of Northwestern University began to recruit scholars, editors, independent researchers, librarians, and graduate students to work on
Editions of Moby-Dick
editing and publishing scholarly, critical texts of Melville’s writings. As part of this effort, Hayford, with the help of Newberry Library staff—especially that of Richard Colles Johnson—collected, catalogued, and curated the many types of items that became the Newberry Library Melville Collection. Located in what became colloquially known as “The Melville Room,” the Newberry Melville collection was comprised of rare first editions of Melville’s writings, numerous file cabinets filled with copies or offprints of articles reviews, essays, and various sorts of Melvilliana. These file cabinets were surrounded by rows of bookshelves containing all the works of criticism and biography that had been published to date. The Newberry Library Melville Room served for decades as an essential repository of primary and secondary materials that Hayford and the Newberry staff made readily available to scholars, editors, and graduate students working not only on the texts of the multi-volume Northwestern-Newberry Writings of Herman Melville series, but on their own Melville-related research projects as well.
The Melville Society Archive
Most of the contents of the original Melville Room are now part of the Melville Society Archive, one of several projects administered by scholar and volunteer members of The Melville Society through its Melville Society Cultural Project. Working in collaboration with the New Bedford Whaling Museum (NBWM), the Melville Society Archive is maintained as a part of the NBWM Research Library. Just as with the original Melville Room, anyone with an interest in doing research related to Melville’s life and writings is welcome to visit, study, and conduct research in New Bedford, MA using the resources of the Melville Society Archive. The MSCP accepts donations of books, manuscripts, papers, and photos. You can visit the New Bedford Whaling Museum’s website for detailed information about visiting, donating, and accessing the resources of the Melville Society Archive.
Database Websites and Traditional Brick and Mortar Archives
Doing original research in libraries, newspaper and periodical archives, museums, and historical society holdings will always be important and essential. But now, more than two decades into the digital information revolution, author- or subject-specific websites complement the resources of the various brick and mortar archives that have been and will continue to be essential to scholars, biographers, and critics doing original research. Two such websites that offer their own unique, complementary resources for Melville scholars, critics, editors, students, and readers are Melville’s Marginalia Online which makes available digital images of the annotations Melville made in books he owned, borrowed, or shared and the Melville Electronic Library which is in the process of establishing online versions of Melville’s writings. Like these two sites, Call Me Herman is proffered as a complementary resource to the archival holdings and catalogs of important and irreplaceable institutions like the Houghton Library of Harvard College, the Berkshire Historical Society, the Melville Society Archive housed and curated in the New Bedford Whaling Museum, the Mystic Seaport Museum, and the New York Public Library. You can of course add to this list many other libraries, museums, and newspaper and periodical archives located throughout the world that are important for understanding Melville’s life and writings.
“Historic Nantucket” – The Melville Issue
Just this past Spring 2012, the quarterly “Historic Nantucket,” published by the Nantucket Historical Association, presented a “Melville Issue.” It opens with an editorial overview by Nathaniel Philbrick, Historian and NHA Research Fellow, and features articles by two well-known Melvilleans — Mary K. Bercaw Edwards, University of Connecticut Maritime Studies Professor, and Hershel Parker, author of the definitive, two-volume Melville biography.
In “The Unemployable Herman Melville: ‘Nothing else to do’ but Sign on a Whaleship,” Hershel Parker offers up a detailed biographical narrative analysis of the years surrounding Melville’s decision on 3 January 1841 – at the young age of 21 – to sign on to the Acushnet. Mary K. Edwards provides a historical discussion of the publishing history of Moby-Dick that focuses on selected important editions – especially those featuring illustrations, including the famous 1930 Lakeside Press, Rockwell Kent edition. Both essays are richly illustrated with reproductions of contemporary portraits, contemporary art works, pages from selected illustrated editions of Moby-Dick, and a manuscript page of a 6 October 1840 letter written by Gansevoort Melville, Herman’s brother.
Inserted into Bercaw’s essay is a sidebar by Julie H. B. Stackpole, “A Special Container for the Lakeside Press Moby-Dick” – an account of Rockwell Kent’s involvement in the Lakeside Edition concluding with a description of the “slipcase” she created for the three-volume Lakeside edition she inherited from her patenal grandfather.
To visit the Nantucket Historical Association’s website, click here.
“A whale ship was my Yale College and my Harvard” – Open Education Resources: Harvard and MIT
Something is changing, and changing fast, in the world of education and scholarship. The Open Education Resource (OER) movement is certainly part of the change and the fact that Harvard and MIT are involved is indicative of how rapidly accelerating is the fast arriving future of learning, research, teaching, and scholarship. If Melville were alive today he would likely include online, OER courses as part of his life-long quest to expand his knowledge and deepen his understanding of the world and universe that so fascinated him.
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By Matt Lewis Read at Daily Beast Yes, Americans are losing faith in almost all institutions these days, but the decline in church attendance has reverberations that will last a long time. As Christians gather... The post via Daily Beast: America’s Losing Faith, and That Makes the Next Trump All But Inevitable appeared first on Frank Schaeffer - Official Blog. [...]
I grew up in the Evangelical right-wing, and my evangelist father was one of the architects of religious right, which went on to wage so many of the culture wars of the 1970s and 1980s,... The post Bio-Denial Evangelicals are America’s Problem appeared first on Frank Schaeffer - Official Blog. [...]
In the 1970’s and 1980’s, I was an evangelical right-wing activist fighting against women’s rights and gay rights and the rise of what we called, “secular humanism.” My father, a famous evangelical leader, has been... The post Frank Schaeffer’s Warning: Fundamentalist Christians Are Overtly Trying to Destroy Democracy appeared first on Frank Schaeffer - Official Blog. [...]
In the 70’s and 80’s, I was part of a movement that sold fake family values, which helped define the evangelical movement and which I’ve spent the last 30 years speaking up and speaking out... The post EVANGELICAL COMPANY PERSECUTES A PREGNANT WOMAN WHO WANTS TO KEEP HER BABY appeared first on Frank Schaeffer - Official Blog. [...]
Opinion by Michael Gerson Read at Washington Post It is the sign of a sickness deeper than covid-19 that the defiance of public health guidance has become a political selling point in the Republican Party.... The post via Washington Post: Opinion: The GOP is facing a sickness deeper than the coronavirus appeared first on Frank Schaeffer - Official Blog. [...]
The Rev. Rick Joyner has called on Christians to arm themselves for civil war. But his children would be on the other side. By Nicholas Kristof Read at New York Times The Rev. Rick Joyner... The post via New York Times: He’s a Famous Evangelical Preacher, but His Kids Wish He’d Pipe Down appeared first on Frank Schaeffer - Official Blog. [...]
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By Frank Schaeffer • President Biden has his eye on the most urgent short and long term issues of the moment—not just on what pundits, the Republicans or the most vocal Democrats want. • President Biden... The post Here’s what’s most impressive about President Biden so far: appeared first on Frank Schaeffer - Official Blog. [...]
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By Shadi Hamid Read at The Atlantic The united states had long been a holdout among Western democracies, uniquely and perhaps even suspiciously devout. From 1937 to 1998, church membership remained relatively constant, hovering at about... The post via The Atlantic: America Without God appeared first on Frank Schaeffer - Official Blog. [...]
After having been unjustly convicted of the bogus charges brought against him in that most infamous and influential of trials, Socrates was asked to propose a penalty for himself. Defying everyone's expectations (exile, paying a fine, delivering a public apology, etc.), Socrates claimed he should be rewarded with free room and board at the Prytaneum. This response upset the Athenians so much that an even greater number than those who had originally found him guilty decided the proper sentence should now be death.In the Crito, and against all sorts of arguments—moral, prudential, political, philosophical—urging him to escape this unjust punishment,… [...]
Ever since I first watched Memento and its fascinating exploration of the philosophical question of personal identity as constituted by memory through time, film director Christopher Nolan has been on my radar. And, Insomnia aside, he has consistently managed to set the bar higher and higher to the point where he stands on a category of cinematographic and philosophical genius all by himself.In addition of being a master of character development, non-linear storytelling and building hair-raising suspense—not to say anything about the pure aesthetic beauty of his films—Nolan is a director of big ideas. There's virtually no film in which he… [...]
The philosophical problem of evil—the question of how the existence of unnecessary suffering is possible in a world created and sustained by an all-powerful, all-knowing and benevolent deity—has vexed theologians and philosophers for millennia.Apologists have attempted to vindicate God's goodness in various versions of what is known as theodicy. One of the most famous was articulated by the Enlightenment polymath Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz. Given that he thought the existence of contingent beings requires an explanation that is itself not contingent, Leibniz deployed a really clever argument to prove the metaphysical necessity of the existence of God. Since God was for… [...]
Life is hard enough as it is. Existence, in many ways, is suffering. Obviously, some have it much worse than others, and that matters, but at some point in our lives we all experience pain, disease, loss, betrayal. We struggle with existential angst, with the fear of meaninglessness, with questions of character, with the impending coming of oblivion. We struggle to pay rent, to put food on the table, and to have enough energy at the end of the day to make a positive difference in the world.And we don't all find love. Few things make the loneliness of existence… [...]
If you are a geek, you are likely to get excited over things others might find boring, laughable, lame, etc. You still like what you like, but you also know when to keep that to yourself.But sometimes you stumble upon something so incredibly brilliant that, no matter what else may be going on in your life, you just have to let your inner geek go nuts. And the following parody of 'Despacito' is just such an instance... [...]
James Baldwin, the great essayist, poet, civil rights activist, writer and orator, would have turned 93 this week. In order to commemorate the importance of his memory and legacy, we are showcasing today the very famous Cambridge debate in which—while surrounded by an overwhelmingly white audience—he courageously and adeptly defended the proposition that “The American Dream is at the expense of the American negro” against the influential conservative writer William F. Buckley, Jr.Prior to this debate, Buckley had made his reputation as a leading American conservative, at least partly, through his writings opposing the civil rights movement and desegregation, and by… [...]
Few figures have been more important and influential in the history of civilization than the ancient Greek philosopher Socrates. And it's not simply that he was a philosopher either. Despite the importance of the intellectual contributions made by his predecessors, and despite the vast differences between them (just think Thales, Anaximander, Pythagoras, Parmenides, Heraclitus, Democritus, etc.), virtually all philosophers who preceded him were ultimately consigned to the category of Pre-Socratics.So what exactly was so special about Socrates that it would be he, and not any of his forerunners, who would be generally recognized to be the first master of philosophy?… [...]
Anyone who's ever contemplated Raphael's celebrated painting The School of Athens knows that the painting centers, quite literally, around Plato and Aristotle (the former pointing up toward his transcendent Realm of the Forms, while the latter attempts to ground his understanding of reality on a much more naturalistic conception). A quick glance also reveals a few other obvious personalities: Socrates, Diogenes the Cynic, Pythagoras, and Euclid (or perhaps Archimedes?). But if you look even closer, you can see that this painting is also paying homage to the Presocratics, those thinkers who dared to imagine the cosmos might be intelligible to… [...]
As his presidency sadly comes to an end, President Obama delivered last night what is sure to become one of the most powerful and memorable speeches in his already admirable history of powerful and memorable speeches.In a time when democracy, justice, freedom, equality and human rights have come under threat in America—as a right-wing administration inspired by unabashed hatred, divisiveness, racism, xenophobia and greed prepares to take office—President Obama's message is a sober and thoughtful reminder that this experiment in self-governing is not a foregone conclusion but a process that requires permanent work, vigilance and cooperation.Thank you for being an… [...]
Art critic John Berger's recent death has left a huge void in the world of art appreciation. While his career prompted numerous controversies and instances of outrage and public condemnation, Berger's attacks on what sometimes amounts to the condescending and elitist attitude of his own profession helped popularize the appreciation of art. His 1972 BBC documentary series Ways of Seeing, as well as its subsequent eponymous book, helped bring the world of thoughtful art appreciation to an entire generation of people who may have otherwise never gotten interested in the fine arts. Unlike conventional forms of art criticism and appreciation—which tend… [...]
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Following the police killing of Daunte Wright in Minnesota, Constance Kassor examines how calls to defund the police can be linked to the Buddhist call to eradicate causes of suffering. The post Commentary: It’s Time to Defund the Causes of Suffering appeared first on Lion's Roar. [...]
Diana Winston teaches a step-by-step meditation to practice in times of tragedy. The post Four Meditations to Practice in the Wake of a Tragedy appeared first on Lion's Roar. [...]
Walking meditation, says Sayadaw U Silananda, reflects the Buddha’s injunction to practice mindfulness while in all the four postures, and in all the activities of our lives. The post The Benefits of Walking Meditation appeared first on Lion's Roar. [...]
Not all habits are bad. Happiness is a habit too, says Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh. Here’s how you can make it grow. The post Watering the Seeds of Happiness appeared first on Lion's Roar. [...]
Anushka Fernandopulle on how mindfulness reduces the suffering caused by our collective sense of separation. The post More Truth, Less Suffering appeared first on Lion's Roar. [...]
Sylvia Boorstein shares a meditation for deepening our sense of interconnectedness. The post Meditation for Interconnectedness appeared first on Lion's Roar. [...]
Pema Chödrön offers a bodhicitta practice for generating love and compassion for all human beings. The post Be Free of Suffering appeared first on Lion's Roar. [...]
Enjoy this introduction to the teachings and meditations of Tsoknyi Rinpoche. The post Cultivating the Carefree Self: The Teachings of Tsoknyi Rinpoche appeared first on Lion's Roar. [...]
The Buddha laid out a four-step path to freedom from difficult emotions. Anyen Rinpoche says the secret is understanding why our emotions cause suffering. The post The 4 Noble Truths of Emotional Suffering appeared first on Lion's Roar. [...]
Valerie Brown returns to gardening to recover her broken spirit, and discovers what really grows in a garden is love. The post Finding Myself in the Garden appeared first on Lion's Roar. [...]
(Natural News) California has launched a new Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) vaccination program called “Operation Homebound” that involves sending police officers to people’s homes to force-vaccinate their special needs children. Shocking video footage – see below – shows masked Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) officers jabbing needles into the arms of scared children with disabilities who... [...]
(Natural News) Following an in-depth safety review, Denmark has decided to permanently ban the Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) injection from AstraZeneca due to the risk of deadly blood clots. The first European nation to do so, Denmark determined that continuing to administer AstraZeneca’s China Virus jab to Danes puts them at undue risk of suffering serious... [...]
(Natural News) Multiple cases of deadly blood clots have prompted health officials in the United States to temporarily halt all further administration of Johnson & Johnson’s (J&J) Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) injection. The so-called “experts” are reportedly working to update physicians all across the country about new vaccine “fact sheets” that warn about the deadly blood... [...]
(Natural News) Prominent advocates of solar power as the renewable energy that can replace fossil fuels have to deal with the fact that the industry’s supply chains are heavily reliant on China’s Xinjiang region. According to multiple governments and human rights organizations, the Chinese Communist Party is currently conducting genocide in China’s northwestern province of Xinjiang. This province... [...]
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(Natural News) Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates finally revealed the reasons behind his massive purchase of farmland: seed science and biofuel development. “The agriculture sector is important. With more productive seeds we can avoid deforestation and help Africa deal with the climate difficulty they already face. It is unclear how cheap biofuels can be but if... [...]
(Natural News) A leaked video currently under examination by the Department of Defense shows what appears to be pyramid-shaped unidentified flying objects (UFO) swarming a Navy destroyer at night. Documentary filmmaker and journalist Jeremy Corbell received the footage, along with detailed information on a classified Pentagon briefing about UFO sightings, from an anonymous source. Together with journalist George Knapp, Corbell... [...]
(Natural News) An audit has found that Maryland’s procurement of 500,000 COVID-19 tests did not adhere to the state’s guidelines. The review by the Maryland Office of Legislative Audits (OLA) found that payments to the South Korean company for the tests were devoid of any written basis to support them. It also found that dealings... [...]
(Natural News) According to the American Heart Association (AHA), death from cardiovascular disease could be reduced by 1.2 million people over the next decade if Americans limited their sodium intake to just 1,500 milligrams. Dieticians and health experts are quick to recommend a low sodium diet. Doctors often say that salt intake is a leading... [...]
(Natural News) Chocolate comes in many forms: dark chocolate, bittersweet chocolate, unsweetened chocolate – even milk chocolate. But if you’re looking for the healthiest chocolate among the bunch, look no further than dark chocolate. Dark chocolate is made up of around 50 to 90 percent cocoa solids and no milk solids. This gives dark chocolate the advantage... [...]
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Oxygen could indicate presence of life on another world, but for red dwarf planets finding oxygen isn't enough. The post Finding Oxygen on an Alien World Doesn't Always Mean There's Life There appeared first on Universe Today. [...]
The effects of ancient asteroid impacts on Earth are still evident from the variety of impact craters across our planet. And from the Chelyabinsk event back in 2013, where an asteroid exploded in the air above a Russian town, we know how devastating an “airburst” event can be. Now, researchers in Antarctica have discovered evidence … Continue reading "100-meter Asteroid Created a Strange Impact Event in Antarctica 430,000 Years Ago" The post 100-meter Asteroid Created a Strange Impact Event in Antarctica 430,000 Years Ago appeared first on Universe Today. [...]
A new study turns modern 'deep learning' techniques on Galileo's early sketches of the Sun. The post Galileo Sunspot Sketches Versus Modern ‘Deep Learning’ AI appeared first on Universe Today. [...]
Whenever I wipe the dust off my coffee table or catch a glimpse of dust motes floating in sunlight, my spacey mind always wonders, is any of that cosmic dust? It just might be. But the amount of space dust that lands on our planet every year might surprise you. Scientists have long known that … Continue reading "Earth Gains 5,200 Tons of Dust From Space Every Year" The post Earth Gains 5,200 Tons of Dust From Space Every Year appeared first on Universe Today. [...]
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Some brown dwarfs rotate so fast that they are flattened spheres. If they rotate any faster they might fly apart. The post Brown Dwarfs can Spin so Fast They Almost Tear Themselves Apart appeared first on Universe Today. [...]
After more than two years in orbit around asteroid Bennu, NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft is ready to come home. It’s bringing with it a pristine sample of space rocks that geologists here on Earth are eager to study up close. The sample will arrive in September 2023, but we won’t have to wait nearly that long … Continue reading "OSIRIS-REx Did One Last Close Flyby of Asteroid Bennu. It’s Almost Time to Come Home" The post OSIRIS-REx Did One Last Close Flyby of Asteroid Bennu. It’s Almost Time to Come Home appeared first on Universe Today. [...]
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In April 2019, scientists released the first image of a black hole in galaxy M87 using the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT). However, that remarkable achievement was just the beginning of the science story to be told. [...]
A global science collaboration using data from NASA's Neutron star Interior Composition Explorer (NICER) telescope on the International Space Station has discovered X-ray surges accompanying radio bursts from the pulsar in the Crab Nebula. The finding shows that these bursts, called giant radio pulses, release far more energy than previously suspected. [...]
Every year, our planet encounters dust from comets and asteroids. These interplanetary dust particles pass through our atmosphere and give rise to shooting stars. Some of them reach the ground in the form of micrometeorites. An international program conducted for nearly 20 has determined that 5,200 tons per year of these micrometeorites reach the ground. [...]
A research team has discovered that the Martian climate alternated between dry and wetter periods, before drying up completely about 3 billion years ago. [...]
Scientists have shown that coral structures consist of a biomineral containing a highly organized organic mix of proteins that resembles what is in our bones. Their study shows that several proteins are organized spatially -- a process that's critical to forming a rock-hard coral skeleton. [...]
A new study explains why people rarely look at a situation, object or idea that needs improving -- in all kinds of contexts -- and think to remove something as a solution. Instead, we almost always add some element, whether it helps or not. [...]
The fossil skull of a woman in Czechia has provided the oldest modern human genome yet reconstructed, representing a population that formed before the ancestors of present-day Europeans and Asians split apart. [...]
We are made of stardust, the saying goes, and a pair of studies finds that may be more true than we previously thought. [...]
Researchers have confirmed for the first time that Pine Island Glacier in West Antarctica could cross tipping points, leading to a rapid and irreversible retreat which would have significant consequences for global sea level. [...]
A single 'super photon' made up of many thousands of individual light particles: About ten years ago, researchers produced such an extreme aggregate state for the first time. Researchers report a new, previously unknown phase transition in the optical Bose-Einstein condensate. This is a overdamped phase. [...]
New distances to two dwarf galaxies with unusually spread-out stars support the idea that these galaxies have little to no dark matter. The post New Distances Support Idea of Dark Matter–less Galaxies appeared first on Sky & Telescope. [...]
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The supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way released an unusual number of strong flares in 2019. Now, astronomers are trying to figure out why. The post Flares from the Milky Way’s Supermassive Black Hole appeared first on Sky & Telescope. [...]
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The countdown has begun to a special total solar eclipse that will cross Mexico, the U.S. and Canada on April 8, 2024. The post T–3 Years Until the 2024 Total Solar Eclipse appeared first on Sky & Telescope. [...]
Bright comets will be scarce this year, but you can see one of the better ones this month as it races from Aquila to Canes Venatici. In other news, a new, bright nova has flared in Sagittarius. The post Make the Most of Comet ATLAS appeared first on Sky & Telescope. [...]
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A Tibetan cosmic-ray observatory has discovered high-energy particle accelerators within our galaxy. The post Tibet Observatory Confirms Existence of Galactic PeVatrons appeared first on Sky & Telescope. [...]
June 10th's annular eclipse of the Sun has a path that crosses southern Canada and the North Pole but will be a challenge to see. The post First Look at 2021’s First Solar Eclipse appeared first on Sky & Telescope. [...]