From Comets to Circles
Pi Day the Nantucket Way
Courtesy of Maria Mitchell Association
On March 14 — written 3/14 in the American calendar — mathematicians, teachers, and curious minds around the world celebrate Pi Day, a holiday dedicated to one of the most famous numbers in mathematics: π (pi).
Pi represents the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter. No matter how large or small the circle, that ratio remains the same: approximately 3.14159, continuing infinitely without repeating.
Which means, technically speaking, every circle — from a coffee mug to the orbit of a planet — shares the same quiet mathematical fingerprint.
That idea, that patterns repeat across scales, is exactly the spirit behind this year’s Maria Mitchell AssociationNantucket STEAM Festival, whose theme is “3.14 Miles from Shore: Infinite Patterns.”
It’s a clever bit of island math.
Because Nantucket, sitting about thirty miles out in the Atlantic, might seem an unlikely place to celebrate abstract numbers. But the island has a long tradition of looking closely at the universe — sometimes literally. The festival traces its inspiration to Maria Mitchell, the
Nantucket-born astronomer who became the first American woman to discover a comet in 1847. Mitchell believed science shouldn’t stay locked in observatories or textbooks. It belonged in the community — in classrooms, in conversations, and in the curiosity of ordinary people.
The STEAM Festival carries that idea forward by blending Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematicsinto a series of island events designed to make complex ideas approachable. And Pi Day provides the perfect entry point.
Pi itself is both simple and endlessly mysterious. Students can measure it with a piece of string and a soup can, yet supercomputers are still calculating its digits into the trillions. It appears in engineering, architecture, navigation, astronomy, and even the physics of waves — which feels appropriate on an island where the ocean provides a daily reminder that nature loves repeating patterns.
Even Nantucket’s geography plays along. The island’s curved shorelines, tidal cycles, and the circular motions of the stars overhead all follow mathematical rhythms. Mariners navigating these waters for centuries relied on geometry and celestial observation — the same principles that fascinated Maria Mitchell when she began scanning the skies from Nantucket rooftops nearly two hundred years ago.
The Nantucket STEAM Festival brings those connections down to earth. Through hands-on demonstrations, talks, and interactive activities, local organizations and educators invite residents and families to explore how science quietly shapes everyday life — from coastal ecology to astronomy to the mathematics hiding in plain sight.
And yes, there will probably be pie.
Pi Day celebrations around the world often lean into the pun, pairing mathematical curiosity with actual baked goods. It’s one of the few academic holidays where both engineers and bakers feel equally qualified to participate. But the larger goal is something Maria Mitchell herself would likely recognize: curiosity as a community activity.
Science, after all, isn’t just something that happens in labs or universities. Sometimes it happens when a kid asks why waves break the way they do. Or why the moon looks bigger near the horizon. Or why a number discovered thousands of years ago still refuses to end.
For a small island surrounded by horizon, those are not bad questions to keep asking. And on March 14, Nantucket will be doing exactly that.
- Carlos Mendoza
Below Deck Contributor
3/7/26
When and Where
This year’s Nantucket STEAM Festival, organized by the Maria Mitchell Association, takes place on Saturday, March 14, 2026 — Pi Day itself — from 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. at the Nantucket High School Gymnasium, 10 Surfside Road. The event is free and open to the public.