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26 March 2004

Amateur Science Loses a Good Friend

This past Monday, 22 March 2004, Janet Mattei, Ph.D., Director of the American Association of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO) passed away after a heroic, seven month-long struggle with Acute Myelogenous Leukemia.

To those of you in the amateur astronomy community, Janet will not need any introduction. She was one of those rare talents in the scientific community who built effective and lasting bridges between the amateur and professional communities. During her 30-year tenure as Director, she expanded AAVSO from a small organization to a truly formidable presence in astronomical science.

She was also a great friend and supporter of SAS. While I never had the pleasure of meeting Janet face to face, I did work with her by phone on a number of occasions. Her knowledge, charm, and unserving dedication to amateur science in general, and variable star astronomy in particular, was a true inspiration. She was, as fellow astronomer David Levy once remarked, "AAVSO's invariable star."

Sheldon Greaves

 

The citizen science community has lost one of its greatest champions. My friend, Janet Mattei, was a gifted astronomer before she took up the citizen science banner. She was way ahead of this curve. She led the American Association of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO) for three decades, that's twenty years before SAS even existed. Her leadership, her passion, her gifts for science and genuine warmth as a human being turned the AAVSO from a relatively obscure special interest organization into the powerhouse of science literacy that it is today. No citizen science group takes more data, contributes to more open research questions, and generates more peer reviewed papers that the AAVSO, and that is entirely due to her extraordinary leadership.

I knew Janet for about eight years and I can honestly say that she has always been a tireless friend to all citizen scientists, and especially to the Society for Amateur Scientists. I was terribly saddened when I heard the news of her passing. Indeed, I see this is as the saddest event in my tenure at SAS. Her spirit was absolutely irrepressible and I shall miss her very much. I can only hope that all leaders in the citizen scientist community will feel her passing as deeply, and will resolve to work even harder within their own communities to try and compensate for her loss.

The AAVSO's next Executive Director is going to need all our support. While that person will have inherited a great organization with every potential for continued success, he or she will have huge shoes to fill. I am reminded of Thomas Jefferson's response when, upon taking up his role the new United States ambassador to France, a French diplomat asked him if he were Benjamin Franklin's replacement. "No one could replace him," Jefferson said. "I am merely his successor."

As those of us who continue to serve the citizen scientist community move forwards, I can't help but think that are all merely Janet's successors.

Shawn Carlson