Family, students, colleagues gather to honor astronomy professor

As the sun set Wednesday, 60 to 70 people gathered on the Oval to peer through telescopes at Jupiter and the Ring and Andromeda nebulas in honor of the late physics and astronomy professor David Friend.
For the first hour of the star party, the sky was covered in clouds but David’s family, colleagues and friends waited the clouds out and ended up seeing Jupiter and four of its moons, a couple of nebulas and a binary star.

“Dave was up there blowing the clouds away,” said Diane Friend, David’s widow and fellow astronomy professor. “Dave hated calling the weather. Before the party I could hear him up there saying, ‘I’m glad it’s you and not me,’” predicting the weather for the star party.
David, 54, loved every aspect of astronomy, especially cosmology – the study of the evolution and origin of the universe, Diane said. She had problems picking her husband’s favorite part of astronomy.
“That’s kind of like asking ‘What’s your favorite food?’” she said. “He just loved it all.”
On May 22, David died after a long battle with Crohn’s disease and cancer. The David B. Friend Memorial Fund has been established through the University of Montana Foundation in his honor and will be awarded to a student who shows excellence in science teaching and outreach.
“He was very interested in getting people excited about science and their place in the universe,” Diane said. “(He liked) providing opportunities for people to share his love of observing and working to understanding the universe.”
David taught astronomy, astrophysics and physics courses at UM for 18 years. From 2005 to 2008 he chaired the physics and astronomy department. In 2005 he received the University of Montana Distinguished Teaching Award.
David received his Ph.D. in astrophysics from the University of Colorado at Boulder. Before accepting a job at UM, he worked at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, the University of Wisconsin, Williams College in Massachusetts and Weber State University in Utah.
Diane said she was planning on hosting an event on campus during fall semester so students could come and honor him. She hadn’t planned on doing anything before fall until staff members expressed interest in having a memorial in late May at the Davidson Honors College because they needed closure.
Although she hosted the event in May, Diane said that when she returned to classes in the fall, a lot of people did not know David had died. Hosting the star party in his honor was a way to let his colleagues know what had happened and for them to stop by, say hi and share stories and memories. For Diane, the bigger reason for the party is that it is the “coolest thing to do in his honor,” she said.
“Having a public party for all; that just seemed like an appropriate thing,” Diane said. The party gave past and present students, colleagues, and staff a chance to have fun looking at the sky, seeing the cloud bands of Jupiter and globular clusters and “just a chance to be curious and explore,” she said.
If it had been clear more people would have showed up, Diane said. But “I’m just tickled pink” at how the party went, she said.
Andrew Ware, chair of the Physics and Astronomy Department, remembers David as somebody who was “very down to earth,” had a “dry sense of humor, and loved skiing and chocolate,” but not necessarily in that order.
“(He was) somebody who was very approachable for the students,” he said.
While people waited for the clouds to clear, Ware walked around the circle handing out chocolate in his honor.
David Dick, a graduate student in anthropology, helped out in the astronomy labs over the last four years and at the Blue Mountain Observatory during summers, where he said he got to know David well.
“Dave enjoyed many aspects of astronomy, and being able to show the public the galaxies and nebulae was something he really enjoyed,” Dick said. “He would’ve really enjoyed this.”
Maggie Driscoll and her younger daughter, Caitlin, came to the party out of respect for David and for her older daughter, Erin, who couldn’t make it to the star party. Erin graduated from UM in May with a bachelor’s degree in physics and is working toward her master’s in physics at the University of Oregon.
“(Erin) had so much respect for him,” Maggie said. “She spoke very highly of him all the time.”
During the two-hour party the telescopes were set up and people came and went, giving their condolences to Diane and searching the sky for objects David loved to observe.
“This was just the kind of thing Dave would’ve loved,” Diane said.
amy.faxon@umontana.edu