S01 E02 "Silent Sky"

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Guests: Emily Rieder, Don Smith

Emily Rieder is a theatre studies lecturer at Guilford College; Don Smith is a physics and astronomy professor. Together they are teaming up for a truly unique production in November..

"Silent Sky" is a Lauren Gunderson play that explores the life of astronomer Henrietta Swan Leavitt (1868–1921), While working as a "computer" at the Harvard College Observatory, she analyzed photographic plates of variable stars without ever using a telescope; Leavitt discovered the luminosiity-period relationship in Cepheid variables, massive stars, with short lifetimes, coining the term standard candles. Her method is now part of the cosmic distance ladder, a compendium of methods now used to measure cosmic distances.

The production is being staged in the campus planetarium, believed to be a unique first for this play. Rieder and Smith discuss the life of Leavitt, the inspiration of the play and the challenges of this production.