2016 Conference - Portland ME
One of Bowdoin's Vertical DialsThe NASS Conference in Portland, ME began with a sundial tour, highlighting the Children's Museum of Maine and the large Camera Obscura. From there, attendees toured a number of sundials including armillary spheres, vertical and horizontal dials, including the Bowdoin College Vertical Dials and Osher Map Library that showed maps with the figure 8 analemma, filling the void in the Pacific Ocean next to comments like "There be dragons here". 
Osher Map Library During the conference a variety of sundials were the topic of presentations. Bob Kellogg presented his digital sundial while Jame Stegenga showed his concrete sundial for the courtyard of a courthouse in Brazil. Patrick O'Hearn showed his handiwork of making wood sundials and Mark Montgomery presented his handiwork of creating a mosaic spherical sundial. Barry Duell talked of his experiment to determine when the moon would shine through his window onto his pillow. By measuring the geometry of the window and bed, he determined the range of acceptable lunar altitude and azimuth. From there, using an ephemeris, he could predict date and time the moon would shine on his pillow as he drifted off to sleep. Other presentations included the anatomy of the astrolabe by Tom Wujec.
Download the Retrospective: 
2016_NASS_Conference_Portland.pdf
(left) Kellogg's Digital Dial & (right) Stegenga's Brazil Dial
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2015 Conference - Victoria B.C.
Ellipsoidal Gnomon Sundial at Stanley ParkThe 2015 NASS Sundial Conference was held in Victoria, B.C. Roger Bailey organized the conference and provided a sundial tour in Victoria, stopping at the BC Legislature Rose Garden dial, the St. Ann's Academy dial, Christ Church Cathedral vertical dial, the BC Government House totem sundial, and more, including a visit out to the Dominion Astrophysical Observatory to see the 1.8 meter telescope.
Steve Luecking discussed spherical and elliptical gnomons where tangent points are dropped to a circle circumscribing the ellipse and hour lines are then drawn as tangents from the points on the circle. Steve used this technique to design a sundial using an elliptical gnomon with symbolic native art for Victoria. (Illustration at right)
Len Berggren described the design and building of a sundial that can show both solar and mean time, done with a $1000 grant from NASS. Presentations included John Schilke discussing the Heliotrope and Heliograph. Barry Duell outlined the history of a sundial at Willamette University donated by the Class of 1916. The dial was dedicated to Prof. Matthews and engraved with his motto of "Sagacity, Audacity, Holiness, Chairty."
Prof. Woody Sullivan described 3 new dials. The first two, an Oculus table and a Solar Hour Benches are at the San Francisco Exploratorium. The third dial at the Very Large Array Radio Telescope in New Mexico is the world's first and only sundial made from one of the original radio telescopes. It was constructed in memory of Prof. Ron Bracewell of Stanford Univ. a pioneer in radio astronomy.
Jackie Jones, Doug Bateman, Sasch Stephens, Fred Sawyer, and Mark Montgomery presented a wide range of topics from reflecting dials, elliptical dials and moon dials, to ancient Egyptian shadow clocks. Bob Kellogg, unable to attend, sent along a video on a new digital gnomon sundial, while Frank King and Steve Luecking discussed optical geometries and illusions.
Download the Retrospective: 2015_NASS_Conference_Victoria.pdf
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2014 Conference - Indianapolis
Founding Fathers George Washington and Dial at Mount VernonIn August, 2014, the North American Sundial Society had a terrific conference in Indianapolis, Indiana, discussing sundial topics from the sundials of Our Founding Fathers where Fred Sawyer talked about the sundials and stories of George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, and Thomas Jefferson.
Ai KhanumDial Peculiarities Discussed by Jack AubertAnother highlight was Jack Aubert's talk on the mysteries of an ancient Greek sundial found at Ai Khanum in the northern of Afghanistan and computing the hour lines. Who built this dial more than 2000 years ago and what kind of mathematics did they use?
Peggy Gunnerson described the evolution of a modern sundial parallelpipeds sculpture, creating an artistic and unusal east-west sundial. And Stephen Lueking presented a series of modern sundial designs for DePaul University. These were just some of the presentations. Subscribe to the digital edition of The Compendium from NASS and receive them all. The annual Sawyer Dialing Prize went to Robert Kellogg for NASS outreach and the invention of a digital sundial. Read more about the presentations and the tour of Indianapolis by downloading the attachment below.
(left) Parallelpiped Dial by Peggy Gunnerson and (right) Point Dial for DePaul University designed by Stephen Luecking
Hosting 46 people, the conference was coordinated by George and Betsy Wilson and Mark an Phyllis Montgomery. During the Friday Sundial tour NASS was welcomed by Eagle Elementary School, the senior high ability class and their teachers. All gathered in the school's courtyard to show a large horizontal sundial, dedicate3d as a memorial to a former teacher, Linda Eads. Download the Retrospective: 2014_NASS_Conference_Indianapolis.pdf
NASS Attendees at Eagle HighSchool Memorial Sundial
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2013 Conference - Boston
CHSI PocketSundialAppropriate to NASS’ visit, Harvard had just recently completed a new major exhibit entitled “Time and Time Again” offering conference members a unique view on the changes in time keeping and the social impact of timekeeping technology. On Friday afternoon, NASS members followed the Time Trails through the Harvard campus, locating historical sundials “in the wild” and timepieces in the Semitic, Peabody, and Natural History Museums.
Solargraphy Presentation by Art PaqueThe day was finished by two presentations “Trading in Time: European Pocket Sundials Designed for Colonial Use in American Territories by Sara Schechner and “Portable Sundials in Austrian Museums” by Ilse Fabian.
During Saturday a plethora of sundial talks were presented by NASS members, including “Counting the Sunny Hours” by Roger Bailey to a new “Wandering Gnomon Sundial Designn” by Fred Sawyer. Bob Kellogg presented the making of an animation illustrating the Ibn al-Shatir sundial proposed for Observatory Park in Virginia for the Analemma Society. One of the most color presentations was Art Paque’s update on Solargraphy, illustrating the technique of forming daily images of the sun a photographic paper that at the last is digitally scanned and preserved.
Download the Retrorespective: 2013_NASS_Conference_BostonCambridge.pdf
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2012 Conference - Asheville
NASS Attendees in front of Burtonsville Quilt SundialThe North American Sundial Society held its 2012 conference in Asheville NC, August 16-19. Alice Io Oglesby and Hugh Munro, local hosts and sundial enthusiasts, took NASS members on a sundial tour through Asheville and the rolling hills of western North Carolina to see the vertical dials at Sunny Point Café and the analemmatic dial of the “kitchen garden” at the Biltmore Estate. In Burnsville, NASS members saw the Quilt Block Sundial, one of over 200 colourful quilt block paintings along the North Carolina Quilt Block Trail. NASS was welcomed by the Mayor of Burnsville and had the Quilt Block sundial explained by Bob Hampton, astronomer designer and Martin Weaver artist. The Quilt Block Sundial in Burnsville was a most impressive example of teamwork and community support. Travelling further, Brian Leonard showed the armillary sundial he fabricated and installed in Marshall, NC.
The NASS conference included exciting talks on a colourful “Parallel Time East West Sundial” presented by new NASS member Peggy Gunnerson and shadow alignments at Toshogu Shrine by Barry Duell of the Tokyo International University. Frank King talked about a most unusual circular analemmatic dial he designed for the Metropolitana of Naples (an Italian job). Dr. King was also this year’s recipient of the Sawyer 
Alice Oglesby Explains Her Analemmatic Sundial
Hugh Monro's Hours to Sunset at Sunny Point Cafe
Dialing Prize. Roger Bailey discussed dials of Mallorca and the “Box of Sapphires”, a compendium designed by Ibn al-Shatir in the 14th century. Fred Sawyer gave a most interesting talk on “Projected Refraction Sundials with Ambigram”, and at the NASS dinner on Saturday, he distributed a special gift to NASS participants: a location specific projected refraction sundial with the ambigram showing “CARPE” on the dial and “DIEM” in the projected shadow. Other speakers with interesting presentations included Alice Io Oglesby, Bill Gottesman, Dudley Warner and Ken Clark. Next year’s conference is being planned for Boston.
Download the Retrospective: 2012_NASS_Conference_Asheville.pdf
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2011 Conference - Seattle
University Prep Academy Pillar DialThe 2011 North American Sundial Society had perfect blue-sky weather for its annual conference held in August 2011. Professor Woodruff “Woody” Sullivan, conference host at University of Washington started the fest by showing off the large vertical sundial built in 1994 on the side of the Physics and Astronomy Building.
The conference covered a wide range of topics including two presentations on stained glass sundials, the 17th work of La Hire and his successful "La Gnomonique ou L'art de tracer Des Cadrans" ("Gnomonicks or The Art of Shadows of Sundials") and dialist-surveyor and one of the founding members of the Acadamie Royale, Jean Picard. The methods of taking photos of the sun over months of time, called Solargraphy, was presented by Art Paque, and then there were talks on the operation of cylindrical sundials, sundials that can show standard time, an update on the Mars sundial, and discussions on solar alignments, heliodons and stair shadows.
Helmut Sonderegger, this year’s recipient of the Sawyer Dialing Prize discussed the Rheticus Memorial sundial designed for Georg Joachim Rheticus, the first Copernican.
Download theRetrospective PDF and read about the conference in detail, including the bus tour of Seattle dials visiting the Pillar Dial of University Prep Academy, Epiphany School Vertical Dial, and Rebecca Cummins analemma and colored skylights in the ceiling of the Montrose Public Library.
2011_NASS_Conference_Seattle.pdf
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- 2010 Conference - Burlington
- 2009 Conference - Portland
- 2008 Conference - St. Louis
- 2007 Conference - McLean
- 2006 Conference - Vancouver
- 2005 Conference - Chicago
- 2004 Conference - Tenafly
- 2003 Conference - Banff
- 2002 Conference - Tucson
- 2001 Conference - Montreal
- 2000 Conference - San Francisco
- 1999 Conference - Hartford
- 1998 Conference - Seattle
- 1997 Conference - Chicago
- 1996 Conference - Toronto
- 1995 Conference - Washington, D.C.