About the Author   Once upon a time, back in the days when the roar of Rocketdyne’s rocket-engine tests in the Santa Susanna mountains would roll through the San Fernando Valley like an earthquake, there was a small gang of fourth-graders who discovered that astronomy was a parent-approved reason to stay out in the backyard all night.  We had an Edmund Scientific 3-inch reflector and a 2.5-inch Sears refractor.  With them, we discovered the craters on the Moon, the rings of Saturn, and the moons of Jupiter, and we dreamed of a life spent studying the universe.  I don’t remember ever seeing a galaxy or nebula, but I have vivid memories of watching the Perseid meteor shower, and less-vivid memories of the members of the gang helping each other to learn how to solve algebra problems. Time passed, we dispersed to our various careers, and the stars themselves faded in the suburban sky.  Then one Christmas, my wife decided that I might enjoy a telescope.  That wonderful 6-inch Newtonian was a portal to new worlds:  the beauty and mystery of the night sky, the community of the Orange County Astronomers, the craftsmen at the Riverside Telescope Makers Conference, larger telescopes (for deeper deep-sky observing), smaller telescopes (for asteroid occultations), CCD photometry, the Society for Astronomical Sciences, and a backyard observatory.  I’ve been privileged to meet remarkable people (some famous, others unsung), see things that most people never witness, and learn about a wide range of phenomena, personalities, and possibilities.  I hope that along the way – as Secretary of the Orange County Astronomers, a Board member of the Society for Astronomical Sciences, as a speaker, writer and mentor – I have been able to help other people expand their horizons as well.  I wrote The Sky Is Your Laboratory as a way of helping other amateur astronomers try their hands at small-telescope research.  The present book will, I hope, give amateur astronomers, students, and instructors a new way to learn about the beauty of the heavens and experience the history of astronomical discovery.   Bob Buchheim December, 2014 Coto de Caza, CA