Largs museum are marking the bicentenary of famous local man Sir Thomas Makdougall Brisbane, who - in a distinguished and varied career - built the town"s first observatory, with an exhibition on his work.

The display runs with this summer"s museum theme and commemorates Sir Thomas of Brisbane Glen"s work both locally and in Australia. It features a model of his observatory, which was one of Scotland"s first.

The event has been organised by a new group, Action for Largs Brisbane Astronomical Heritage (ALBAH), which includes the Largs and District Historical Society and Professor John Brown, Astronomer Royal for Scotland.

The local observatory was built in 1808 and sat in the Brisbane Glen. To align his telescope with the skies, Brisbane built two Meridian pillars on the Glen and three large stone pillars - called the 'Three Sisters' - which sit just by Waterside Road. The observatory and its Meridian pillars have since fallen into ruins, with Brisbane having taken all his equipment with him to New South Wales in 1821 where he was State Governor.

He later built a similar observatory at Paramatta outside Sydney, Australia, leading to thousands of new stars being discovered, and the publication of the 'Catalogue of 7385 Stars Chiefly in the Southern Hemisphere', earning him the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society. His contribution to early astronomy is honoured in the city he governed and named in his esteem, by the Sir Thomas Brisbane Planetarium.

Full feature with pictures in the News of August 13, 2008