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D. Casebeer, M. Blaylock, J. Deaton, D. Branch, E. Baron, D. Richardson (Oklahama U.), C. Ancheta (San Diego State)
We are preparing for publication atlases of supernova spectra that were recorded photographically at Palomar Observatory by J.~L.~Greenstein and F.~Zwicky between 1954 and 1970, and at Lick Observatory by various observers between 1937 and 1971. Microphotometer transmission tracings of the photographic plates have been digitized and plotted on a common scale with a linear wavelength axis. (The Lick spectra were prismatic and therefore nonlinear in their original form.) In all, there are 134 spectra of 30 supernovae, including 13 spectroscopically normal SNe~Ia, two spectroscopically peculiar SNe~Ia (1957A and 1960H), one SN~Ib (1954A), two SNe~Ic (1962L and 1964L), and nine SNe~II. These events include some of the brightest supernovae to appear during the decades before supernova spectra began to be recorded with linear detectors. Distances to the parent galaxies of two of them (SNe~1937C and 1960F) have been measured by means of Cepheids. For some of these events no spectra have been published previously. Although these old data are vastly inferior to modern data for studying the relative strengths of spectral features, they are useful for classification and for measuring wavelengths of spectral features.
The author(s) of this abstract have provided an email address for comments about the abstract: casebeer@mail.nhn.ou.edu