Date marks on gnomon
When building the Webster Dial, I realized that the shadow of the equatorial disk on the gnomon could be used to indicate the date. That also showed the apparent motion of the sun across the sky generates a cone. The cones generated by the sun during the solstices are plus or minus 23.4 degrees and are tilted corresponding to the latitude of the observer. I found the cones intriguing and they struck an aesthetic chord.
In 1990, I volunteered lots of labor hours building the Fremont Troll, and the hairy old curmudgeon introduced me to the Fremont Arts Council (FAC) and Fremont's claim as the Center of the Universe. The FAC informs everyone that everyone is an artist, and I like most people, responded favorably. Public art was a part of the FAC culture that I embraced. I tried to do a "solstice day" art installation at one of the famously decorated Fremont Winter Solstice Feasts and learned that a flat wall piece does not cut it, the conic shape is important. At a subsequent feast, I made a small piece that had the equinox disk and solstice cones. We played with it in the sun the next day during cleanup, and I was hooked on the shadows.
In the year 2000, lots of building was going on in Fremont, and a Request for Proposal was sent out for a large sculpture that would delineate the entry to Fremont. I did not consider myself enough of an artist to respond, but a friend, Peter Toms, took me aside and said I should give it a shot. I thought the Solstice Dial would be great, and since I had no chance of developing the winning proposal, I dared to propose a 40' tall version and made a 1/23.5 scale model.
To my surprise, the proposal was deemed a finalist, I even got a few bucks for modifying it after new conditions were imposed on the required style. However, my design lost to the intriguing stainless steel abstracts installed on the building to the east of the intersection of N 34th St. and Fremont Ave. N, Seattle WA. But the Solstice Dial was not forgotten!
When talk of an Alger sundial started, I was asked at a Chuckanut Transition meeting to describe my idea. As I failed miserably to describe the complex beauty of my solstice dial, I was asked to sketch it, which I did with even worse result. When I got home, I remembered vaguely that the Fremont model had made the move when I fled Seattle for my current home in Alger. Two days later, after only a short treasure hunt, I found the model in my shop. When I dug it out from under 14 years of accumulation, on September 11, of 2019, I saw the band around the stem saying "Center of the Universe." At that moment I felt the Center of the Universe shift from Fremont to Alger...
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