A Study of Nine High-Redshift Clusters of Galaxies. I. The Survey

We present a description of the observations and data reduction proceduresfor an extensive spectroscopic and multi-band photometric study of nine highredshift, optically-selected cluster candidates. The primary goal of the surveyis to establish new constraints on cluster and galaxy evolution, with specificemphasis on the evolution of galaxy morphology and on the star-formationhistory of the galaxies within and around distant clusters. We have measured892 new redshifts for galaxies with R <= 23.3. The data will also serve as deepprobes of the foreground and background large-scale structures. Theobservations include broad band optical imaging and spectroscopy with the LowResolution Imaging Spectrograph at the 10 meter W. M. Keck Observatorytelescope; K-band imaging with IRIM at the 4 meter Kitt Peak NationalObservatory telescope; and deep, high angular resolution imaging with the WFPC2onboard the Hubble Space Telescope. We also describe the procedures used toobtain morphological information. We have established that six of the ninecluster candidates are indeed real space density enhancements and arerepresentative of those typically associated with clusters of galaxies. Theremaining three candidates appear to be projections of several smaller groupsat widely separated distances. This success rate is consistent with estimatesof the false positive rate in 2D optical high-z cluster searches.Comment: Accepted for publication in the Astronomical Journal. 22 pages, including 3 figure