"Come Light, Visit Me"

The 6 1/2-foot tall steel sundial on the west side of the newly restored Roger H. Perry Hall.

by Kate Pond

The new sundial by Burlington sculptor Kate Pond and sundial designer Bill Gottesman was formally dedicated Friday, Aug. 13, at 10 a.m. as more than 50 members of the National Sundial Society looked on at Champlain College's new Roger H. Perry Hall and Student Welcome Center.

"While students might not be able to use it to always get to class on time, it is accurate and able to show the correct time during both daylight saving and standard time," explained Gottesman, of Precision Sundial LLC, who worked with Pond on the design and precise location of the 6 1/2-foot tall steel sundial on the west side of the newly restored historic 151-year-old brick mansion.

"This new sundial is beautiful in two ways," observed Roger Bailey of Sidney, British Columbia, a sundial enthusiast who attended the dedication. "It is artistic and it is correct. The mystery of the universe, time, and the sense of the relationship between the sun and the earth is all captured in the essence of this sundial."

The timely work of art was commissioned two years ago as construction work was about to begin on the new student welcome center. A plaque adjacent to the sundial explains how it works.

The sundial is the second art installation on the Champlain College campus in the past year-a cast-bronze statue of French explorer Samuel de Champlain by Vermont sculptor James Sardonis was placed on the Rozendaal Courtyard near Alumni Auditorium as part of the state's Lake Champlain Quadricentennial celebration in July 2009. -SM

How it works

N 44° 28.340 W 073° 12.248

The two ends of the helical section of corten steel serve as gnomons, casting shadows for standard and daylight saving time on the inner surface of the dial. Time is indicated by the dominant shadow, top in the summer and bottom in the winter. An adjacent plaque provides the longitude and equation of time correction.

The sundial utilizes the properties of an equatorial ring. Shadows cast from the meridian gnomon at 15° intervals indicate the hour lines on the inside of the ring. These hour marks are at 30° segments around the ring. Any of the hour mark positions have similar geometric properties, so the daylight saving gnomon at the one hour mark from the meridian will correctly show local daylight saving time. The helical curved edges allow for the position of the sun at different solar declinations.

For more information about sundials, visit www.sundials.org.