CCD photometry of NGC 6101 - Another globular cluster with blue straggler stars

Results are presented on CCD photometric observations of a large sample of stars in the southern globular cluster NGC 6101, and the procedures used to derive the color-magnitude (C-M) diagram of the cluster are described. No indication was found of any difference in age, at the less than 2 Gyr level, between NGC 6101 cluster and other clusters of similar abundance, such as M92. The C-M diagram revealed a significant blue straggler population. It was found that, in NGC 6101, these stars are more centrally concentrated than the cluster subgiants of similar magnitude, indicating that the blue stragglers have larger masses. Results on the magnitude and luminosity function of the sample are consistent with the bianry mass transfer or merger hypotheses for the origin of blue straggler stars.