Not many people find their calling in their mid-60s, but Herman Hyne did.
“I had many different jobs, never had a career in one, though,” says Hyne, 76.
“I … worked in sales, as a lab technician, at Pratt Library for a while ? the longest job I ever had was 12 years as a office manager for a small construction company.”
But if you go to the Inner Harbor on a clear night this summer, you?ll likely find the gray-bearded pensive astronomer Hyne, dressed in a red-and-white striped shirt and straw hat, energetically pointing out Mars? or Jupiter?s moons or the ring around Saturn to wide-eyed children and tourists.
“I got interested in science and astronomy in at Garrison Junior High in Northwest Baltimore ? Mrs. Wicker?s eighth-grade class,” Hyne said.
That was 1942.
“It was a backyard hobby for a long time,” says Hyne, who lives in Waverly and eventually earned a degree in elementary education from Coppin State University, but said he didn?t find much success.
“I could never remember students? names,” said Hyne, still slightly embarrassed by the admission. “And to be a good teacher, you have to remember the kids? names.”
Hyne tells his story casually as he pulls out his metallic blue telescope, purchased in 1981 for $1,300, from a silver trunk.
It looks initially like something Homeland Security should be concerned about, but by the time he has it set up on his tripod, curious onlookers are already beginning to hover.
Jugglers, break-dancers, a snake handler and a clarinet player nearby compete for those $1 suggested donations, but the line around the professorial astronomer is steady.
“Is it real?” says 7-year old Marwa Abdelsadelsaddig, who is visiting Baltimore from the Sudan with her family and staring at a perfect, tiny, nearly vertical ring looping Saturn.
“Can you see it?” she asks her dad, and then asks once more again, “Is it real?”
“She has an atlas at home ? she is verysmart, very interested in science and the planets,” boasts her proud father, Mohammed. He says he?s never been to Baltimore and they are here visiting family. He and his daughter have never seen the rest of the solar system before, either. “You never know what you are going to see when you travel.”
