18!
This Red Oak native may have a record that no other local will ever eclipse.
Derryl Barr was born here in 1944, son of Clyde and Helen Barr. They were living on the farm of his grandfather, Carl Barr, in 1948 when the family moved to Scranton, about 15 miles east of Carroll. Derryl never moved back to Red Oak, but he did move around to see the total eclipse of the sun – the one on Monday, which he watched from a ranch in Nebraska, was the 18th he’s witnessed.
His record is noteworthy, as he’s one of the world’s leaders in witnessing and studying eclipses. He’s seen nearly 50 minutes of total eclipses, among the leaders on a log of international eclipse chasers.
An teacher by trade, he speaks about solar eclipses to local, national and international groups. His passion for solar eclipses has taken him to seven continents and across nearly all of the oceans of the world.
He said his interest took flight when he was teaching English at North Platte High School in 1979, the last time a solar eclipse crossed the contiguous U.S. He and his students watched it from inside – a 90
percent covering of the sun. He said that wasn’t enough, and decided he needed to see it in totality. It was more than a decade later – after a health scare that made him realize he needed to get to his bucket list before it was too late. He told his wife, Pam, he wanted to watch an eclipse cross the southern tip of Baja, California, in July 1990. He eventually made some last-minute travel arrangements and watched the six-minute eclipse.
The chase was on.
But it’s not always easy – or safe. He related a story of a 1999 trip to Turkey, where members of a Kurdish liberation group announced tourists were valid targets. Total eclipses occur every two or three years, but they don’t always cross easy-to-reach places – they might occur over deserts, mountain ranges, oceans, or other locations where it’s difficult to reach.
As Iowans, Nebraskans and Missourians realized in the last week, there are people from all over the world who want to witness an eclipse, and part of the equation is having good roads and places for people to stay when one occurs in an easy-to-reach place.
Despite that, he’s been to many places to see them – Baja, Calif., in 1991; Bolivia in 1994; India in 1995; Mongolia in 1997; Venezuela in 1998; Turkey in 1999; Zambia in 2001; Australia in 2002; Antarctica in 2003; from a ship near the Pitcaim Islands in 2005; Egypt in 2006; Russia in 2008; a ship in the Phillipines Sea in 2009; Tatakoto Island in 2010; Australia in 2012; Svalbard Islands in 2015; and Bangka Belitung Islands in 2016.
Moved back to Iowa
After high school, Barr served in the army for a year in Vietnam. He graduated from Westmar College, which was in LeMars, with a bachelor of science degree in 1967, and earned a master’s degree from the University of Northern Iowa in 1974. His home for 37 years was North Platte, where he taught school, ran his own irrigation company, and wrote an astronomy column for the local newspaper. From 2003 to 2011, he taught an observational astronomy course at Mid-Plains Community College in North Platte.
His astronomical interests go beyond eclipses. In a promotional brochure for an event where he was appearing, it said, “Derryl Barr has been involved in astronomy for most of his life, and has recently witnessed for the second time Saturn’s return to the exact location where he first telescopically observed it in 1958, making him two in Saturnine years.” It also noted, “In addition, he has observed from ingress to egress both the 2004 and 2012 transits of Venus, an event that will not occur again until 2117. And while he plans to observe as many more solar eclipses as Time allots him, he doubts that any more Venusian transits are in his future.”
He now lives in Indianola, south of Des Moines, where he and his wife can be near their grandchildren. He served as an adjutant instructor in the horticulture department at Des Moines Area Community College, volunteered during Drake Observatory’s public nights, and served as secretary of the Des Moines Astronomical Society.
And of course, he speaks about his passion to many groups. He was in Sidney in July, and there he was met by three cousins who still live in the Red Oak area – Richard Barr,