We have begun a survey of the chemical and dynamical
properties of the Milky Way disk as traced by open star clusters.
In this first contribution, the general goals of our survey are outlined
and the strengths
and limitations of using star clusters as a Galactic disk tracer sample
are discussed.
We also present medium resolution (R ≈ 15,0000) spectroscopy of open
cluster stars obtained with the Hydra multi-object spectrographs on the
Cerro Tololo
Inter-American Observatory 4-m and WIYN 3.5-m telescopes. Here we use
these data
to determine the radial velocities of 3436 stars
in the fields of open clusters within about 3 kpc,
with specific attention to stars having proper motions in the Tycho-2
catalog.
Additional radial velocity members (without Tycho-2 proper motions)
that can be used for future studies of these clusters were also
identified.
The radial velocities, proper motions, and the angular distance of the
stars from cluster center are
used to derive cluster membership probabilities for stars in each cluster
field using a non-parametric approach,
and the cluster members so-identified are used, in turn, to derive the
reliable bulk three-dimensional motion for
66 of 71 targeted open clusters.
The high probability cluster members that we identify help to clarify the
color-magnitude
sequences for many of the clusters, and are prime targets for future
echelle resolution spectroscopy
as well as astrometric study with the Space Interferometry Mission (SIM
Planetquest).