ACTIVITY CYCLES IN COOL STARS .1. OBSERVATION AND ANALYSIS-METHODS AND CASE-STUDIES OF 4 WELL-OBSERVED EXAMPLES

This is the first in a series of papers devoted to the ongoing long-te rm monitoring program of activity cycles in cool stars at Lowell Obser vatory. In this paper we discuss the various spectral diagnostics we h ave at our disposal and how we calibrate these diagnostics to flux. We then present our current database for four well-studied stars, HD 107 00, HD 22049, HD 39587, and the Sun, comparing our results to results obtained by other investigators and discussing how our new database co mplements existing work. With the same data we demonstrate our ability to detect activity cycles and rotational modulation in a variety of d iagnostic lines for stars of widely differing activity levels and spec tral types.