Here is a portion about that from the first interview:
Did you have afterschool activities or astronomy clubs?
We certainly had afterschool activities, but no astronomy clubs. I did have help from the fact that for two years we lived in Reno between the ages, well I went to fifth and sixth grade there, and we had clear dark skies, particularly the second year, I guess the second 18 months where we lived in a block that only had three houses in the whole block and there was a ranch on one side of us so we really had dark skies. It probably had something to do with (my astronomy interest) but I don’t think it’s the whole thing. I think I was interested in it even before that.
What was it that you wanted to learn in astronomy?
I don’t really know. I never had a telescope. Amateur telescopes that were worth anything were not common or cheap in my childhood. But I’m not sure that what I was really interested in was more the science than just looking although I did form an astronomy club between 5th and 6th grade to get my friends to meet with me once a week during the summer to study the constellations.
So, did you have a book to refer to?
There was a book called “Seeing Stars” which you could buy for 10 cents in those days, believe it or not, I’ll call it a hardback book. It was not a softback book in the sense that the book cover was sturdy but it was a pamphlet type book. But it was quite nice. It had a page for each constellation, a picture of the constellation, a description of where it was, and a little bit about the subject and we used that as a textbook.
Were you successful. Did you find all the constellations?
Yes, I think so. This was summer so we couldn’t really find the winter constellations. It was a very easy book to follow. It was a good book. This was around 1937 or 1936.