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Category: Master Plan

The Jamestown Dial was dedicated on 12 Sep 2007 and is the first of what will be a series of educational sundials and historic scientific astronomical instruments.  In the Fairfax County Park Authority's Master Plan for Turner Farm in Great Falls, VA:

"The Astronomy Garden, located north of the observatory and main parking area, is a popular spot for small educational and social gatherings. The garden nicely complements the park’s past and current relationship with celestial exploration. The garden area currently contains a small sundial collection. It is recommended that elements within the garden be expanded to display additional artistic and scientific astronomical instruments to engage the public as well as to serve as an event space to accommodate larger groups. The expansion of the garden should include additional seating areas, vegetation, and interpretive signage. An expanded focus on sundials would provide an excellent education about time, displaying both the rotation and revolution of the Earth and Earth's orientation, explaining the seasons. Astronomical observation was of particular importance to agrarian societies, establishing an interpretive link between the prior astronomical usage of the site to the farming history of the site. The astronomy garden should be incorporated into a large astronomical calendar and observatory. This interpretation device might be built as a henge, or stone circle, of moderately sized stones or columns to educate park visitors about astronomical movements throughout the year."

Today you can find a scale model of the solar system as you walk from the parking lot to the Roll-Top Observatory Building when attending PARKTAKES seminars or coming to visit a public Friday Night Observing session.  We expect that we shall shortly have an Analemmatic (or Human) sundial along the walkway as well.  The most significant sundial in planning is a replica of the Ibn al-Shatir sundial, the first "modern" sundial made in 1371 for the Great Mosque in Damascus.