Goodsell Observatory

Can you visit Goodsell Observatory? Yes

Free monthly Friday open houses, about 7-9 pm, with historic and modern telescopes; check site for weather cancellations.

A public night at an observatory usually starts at dusk with a short talk, then a line at the eyepiece of the main telescope for the Moon, a planet or a bright cluster, with volunteers' smaller telescopes set up outside. Dress for the night air even in summer: domes are not heated, so the telescope stays at outside temperature. Many nights sell out or cancel for clouds, so check the observatory's site on the day.

Telescopes at Goodsell Observatory

16-inch Brashear, 8-inch Clark refractors.

How dark the sky is at Goodsell Observatory

Goodsell Observatory has no Bortle rating in the list yet. The scale below shows what each class looks like.

Sky brightness and class come from the World Atlas of Artificial Night Sky Brightness (Falchi et al. 2016, CC BY-NC 4.0), with natural skyglow added, at the coordinates below. Research telescopes are often sited on mountains above the haze, so the real sky can be darker than the map suggests.

Goodsell Observatory among the observatories of Minnesota

Green dots are observatories open to the public, blue dots research or private sites, squares dark sky places; select one for its page. See Minnesota observatories for the full list.

The coordinates on this page point to city Northfield (approximate): 44.459°N, 93.167°W.

Map data © OpenStreetMap contributors. Open the larger map · Directions. Mountain observatory roads are often gated after dark; go only on a scheduled public night.

Dark sky places, observatories and clubs near Goodsell Observatory

Nearest dark sky places

Other observatories open to the public within 150 km

• Macalester College ObservatorySt. Paul, Minnesota, 53 km (33 mi). Occasional free open observatory nights listed on the Macalester calendar
• Eisenhower ObservatoryHopkins, Minnesota, 59 km (37 mi). Hopkins Community Education public viewing nights (register via Community Ed), fall and winter-spring sessions
• Eagle Lake Observatory (Onan Observatory)Norwood-Young America, Minnesota, 69 km (43 mi). Minnesota Astronomical Society public star parties at Eagle Lake Observatory (see mnastro.org calendar)
• Sola Fide ObservatoryAustin, Minnesota, 89 km (55 mi). Free public viewing on select Saturdays Apr-Sep, 9-11 pm, alternating moon and deep-sky nights

Astronomy clubs within 150 km

• Steele County Astronomical SocietyOwatonna, Minnesota, 42 km (26 mi). Meets 1st Thursday monthly, 6:30 pm
• Minnesota Astronomical SocietyMinneapolis, Minnesota, 58 km (36 mi)
• Rochester Astronomy ClubRochester, Minnesota, 74 km (46 mi). Meets Monthly Tuesday, 7-9 pm

Star parties near Goodsell Observatory

Planning a trip? Astrotourism in Minnesota puts the dark sky places, observatories, clubs, star parties, planetariums and science centers of the state on one map, with the best night out worked out.

Goodsell Observatory record

From the site's observatories dataset (observatories_q426). Distances are computed from the coordinates.