Go Schools ( Two Pictures ) Please Educate our Children
I have been an amateur astronomer now for some 35 years.( to year 2004). My first interest was when Apollo eleven touched down in July 1969. A pair of binoculars bought for a Christmas present soon after started me off observing the Moon and bright starfields. It was not long after that I had purchased my first telescope and saw the rings of Saturn for the first time which was wonderful. Since then I have often spent some 60 hours per week involved with the subject.
I have a grow up Daughter and Son and I have eight Grand children. They each have four children and are all boys except the youngest a little girl.. They are all between one and sixteen years of age, ( January 2005). I am now retired and have more time for everyone and also I can spend more time doing what I enjoy most. Astronomy. My full time job over the years was that of a Gloucester Postman working for Royal Mail (formerly the GPO). This I did for some 40 years and 6 months from September 8th 1963 to March 20th 2004.
I am considered an experienced practical observer and enjoy teaching.
I was honoured to be invited by His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales to a garden party at Highgrove House in Gloucestershire in July 1993. Recently in November 1999 I was invited to luncheon in the presence of Her Majesty The Queen and His Royal Highness The Duke Of Edinburgh at the Mansion House in London. Some 400 individuals from all walks of life and every field of endeavour were nominated for their achievements throughout the century.To meet so many famous people in one event was an amazing experience. One could watch television for a decade or more and not see so many celebrities. I thank the Lord Mayor and lady Mayoress The Lord and Lady Leven of Portsoken for their gracious invitation.
On the 17th to 18th of August 2001 by kind invite I was honoured to visit and stay with Sir Patrick Moore at his home.See pictures( 813KB ). I have visited and stayed at Patricks on several occasions since in particular in this year (2004). A very memorable event was the Venus transit of the 8th June where a hundred people saw the transit from Patricks observatory at his home. See images of the event.The weather was so kind to us all and the views through lots of telescopes were spectacular. On a more sad note a bad Salmonella poisoning put Patrick in hospital at the end of June. I had travelled down to visit him in hospital on the 27th June. He was so ill at the time and to take some of his worries away I offered to stay at his home and house mind. Not to forget his little cat Jeannie being cared for. I enjoyed house minding for my friend and such a great man. I spend many nights alone in his wonderful astronomical library. Photographs and honourary doctorate certificates are everywhere and I took many dozens of the great mans phone calls for about 10 days. He was finally released from Chichester hospital and is now well again. This in all was an experience I will never ever forget. I got to speak to so many well known people and also some very famous and great friends of Patrick's. Patrick has done so much for British astronomy and has been an active observer throughout the whole of his life. He has the honour of running the longest BBC TV program called "The Sky at Night" and has written over 100 books on the subject. See Article on my earlier visit.
For many years I studied the planets Mars and Venus but eventually decided to switch to Deep Sky work, especially astrophotography. One early observational success was to become the 4th BAA (British Astronomical Association) member to recover Comet Halley at 14th magnitude in 1985 using a 21.6cm reflector. See picture of 14th magnitude Halleys comet
My own observatory, "Mount Tuffley Observatory" was Officially inaugurated by TV astronomer Heather Couper. It is now equipped with a Meade LX200 which is fully computerized. It is very fast and easy to find objects quickly using the built in database and the "go-to" object command. I use the British made Starlight Express MX916-usb CCD imaging camera. Both telescope and CCD camera are network linked from the observatory to my home study. The telescope can be sent commands via software to find, centre and image any object in seconds from any remote location via the Internet.
I also had occasion to use the largest optical reflecting telescope in UK which is at St Andrews University in Scotland by kind invite of an undergraduate student. The James Gregory reflector has a main mirror of 37 inches in diameter. See picture of the 37 inch telescope.
By 1982 I had captured the interest of people from far and wide. In 1984 I had a sudden visit by several members of "The Cotswold Astronomical Society" Gloucestershire UK. I have to thank a certain member for naming my observatory Mount Tuffley. It is not sited on a mount incidently. I had also become very involved with many astronomy groups. I became a branch coordinator for the Cotswold AS. See picture of the 1st CAS star party held at Mount Tuffley. I am also a member of the British Astronomical Association and was elected into the Royal Astronomical Society in January 1990. I am also a member of "The Astronomer". The "TA "as it is known correlates the pro-amateur work World wide and supplies the latest discovery news and observations. I am also a member of the "Society for Popular Astronomy" For nearly a decade I was their Deep Sky director. Over the years I often receive interesting letters. Take for example the Monk who had seen a bright shooting star from the famous Prinknash Abbey in the Cotswolds. Or the request by a naval officer for my photograph of Halleys comet taken in 1985 which was to travel the high seas aboard the aircraft carrier the HMS Illustrious. Other events such as the 1985 National Astronomy week that was organized mainly by local astronomical societies all over UK. I and members of the Cotswold AS had their rewards. One night some 88 people viewed Halleys comet at my observatory in the one night alone. On that evening I held a young cripple girl with great difficulty at the eyepiece whilst her parents gave her extra support. She exclaimed "I can see a tiny grey blob". My answer was she was looking at Halleys comet. It is this sort of thing that makes me tick.
"Teaching"
The individual amateur astronomer who is keen to promote astronomy and get young people interested in the subject need not be a qualified teacher or possess professional qualifications to do so. I held my first astronomy lecture and slide presentation at the observatory for a Junior school in 1978 and since then have had several hundred group visits; indeed one school from Stroud in Gloucestershire UK was involved with the TV Channel 4 "Equinox" series in the program called "Earth Calling Basingstoke" featuring myself teaching school children, showing them the observatory and describing my own studies including my search for supernova. However, I am self taught from many years of private study. I have found teaching astronomy has enhanced both my own interest in the subject and the knowledge of others from all walks of life. Finally I have also featured on Television on many occasions with topical events such as the comet Swift Tuttle and Hale Bopp.
For several years the BBC Radio Gloucestershire have broadcasted on a regular basis my astronomy and space news updates. Also a while back articles covering The Night Sky this month was published for many years by the press, including many dozens of full page spreads by the Gloucester local newspaper, The Citizen.
I also took part in Sir Patrick's astronomy series."The Sky at Night" in October in year 2002.
Many of my deep sky images and pictures were shown on the program called "Picture Perfect" An
astrophotography competition was launched in this program. Dr Stephen Wainright also took part and described how
one can take fine astonomy images using simple web,and security cameras.
On the 30th of November 2002, I was at Sir Patrick's in Selsey UK with Stephen and the BBC TV crews for the judging
of the astrophotography competition. It was a difficult task as so many fine pictures were submitted and from all
around the World. On my visit I had occasion to meet the Astronomer Royal, Sir Martin Rees. Sir Martin was talking
to Sir Patrick about Cosmology. This excellent interview and discussion was shown on the 600th Sky at Night
in the December 2002. The program ended with showing of our selected perfect astronomy pictures.
Whilst visiting I had occasion to meet the famous Soprano, Catherine Galloway. Catherine gave me her latest music
album called simply "With Love". She has a most wonderful voice and she played the piano and sang to
Sir Patrick, his guests and I at his home that evening. Roger Prout Catherines partner did the verses prior to
the love songs. I also had occasion to meet and chat to Sir Timothy Ackroyd, 3rd. Baronet Dewsbury, Actor and Director.
I also met Linsey Baxter from the crime series Agatha Christie's Partners in crime ITV series.
SARA - UK Radio Astronomy Conference. September 25 - 26th 2004
By kind invite from friend, and experienced amateur radio astronomer Rob Davis I spent time at Jodrell Bank Cheshire for the 2004 SARA - UK Radio Astronomy Conference. An excellent workshop with many lectures and talks throughout were given, including one by myself which was a little away from radio astronomy but they seemed to enjoy it. I personally learned much about radio astronomy. Rob others and I had occasion to be in the control room of the 7-metre in use scanning the main arms of the Milky Way using the new digital hydrogen-line receiver. Many thanks to Ian Morrison and Tim O'Brien, Jodrell bank Observatory for their time and knowledge given to us all. See pictures at Jodrell Bank on the Cheshire plains.
"The Steavenson Award".
On the 25th of June 2005 I was awarded by The British Astronomical Association, "The Steavenson Award" by the president Mr Tom Boles. This top astronomy award was presented to me at The Cavendish Laboratories in Cambridge.UK. I felt deeply honoured and highly delighted to receive it. There were over 150 present. It was also the BAA exhibition meeting and many members had put on excellent astronomy displays, including much of their own excellent visual observations, photographic displays and CCD images.
My astronomy has taken off with my astrometry and my private observatory called Mount Tuffley Observatory has
now been given an official I.A.U.observatory code. It is listed as, IAU code J93. The observatory code for Greenwich
is code 00.00 and for the Hubble space telescope is, Code 250
I and many others around the World are currently keeping an eye on Near Earth Asteroids and submit our observed
and calculated orbital measurements and data to the Smithsonian Institute. MA. USA. Here from MTO my astrometry
and photometry of both the asteroids and the comets I study are frequently used to update the orbits of these Solar
System objects. Hopefully, we who do this work are helping to make the World a safer place from the remote possibility
of an impactor arriving unnoticed.
"The Lick Observatory 36 inch refractor on Mount Hamilton. California".
In October in the year 2005 for three full weeks, bar one night I joined other astronomers to observe the planet
Mars. I used the second largest refractor in the World, the 36 inch Lick refractor. This
Link will take you to my my experiences throughout my stay at the Lick observatory on Mount Hamilton, and to my
drawings of Mars I made at the eyepiece.
On the night of the October 08th 2005, I and Bill Sheehan had the sole use of the 60 inch telescope at Mount Wilson.
We both observed deep sky objects all night long through this great telescope. The views seen through the 4 inch
eyepieces with the naked eye were incredible. Myself at the eyepiece of the 60 inch telescope
on Mount Wilson Observatory in California.
Pluto namer: Over the years I have been greatly honoured to have met up with many famous people at Sir
Patrick Moore's home at Farthings in West Sussex. On 14th September 2006 I met up with the namer of Pluto. It was
a wonderful honour to take part in such friendly and informative chat with such a famous lady..
In 1930 Cyde Tombaugh discovered Pluto. In 1930 a young oxford schoolgirl aged just 11 years named, the then, new
ninth planet as Pluto.
Her name was Venetia Phair (nee Burney) now is the grand age of 88 years (2006). Go
to pictures of Venetia and Patricks private observatory.
On the 9th November 2006 I and other invited guests attended a fine party at Sir Patrick Moore's home in Selsey west Sussex. It was held to mark the launch of the book "BANG" written by Brian May (Queen) Patrick Moore and Chris Lintott. It was a great event all round. I also enjoyed being the barman as everyone arrived. Details and pictures of can be found on this link. On the 7th of November I also was given the job, and enjoyed showing over a dozen visitors from the Basingstoke Astronomical Society around Sir Patrick's observatory. Patricks 15inch telescope was greatly admired. They also enjoyed my many stories that I have been told and learned from Patrick over the years on my visits. Link to: Pictures and some details of The "BANG" party
Finally keep an eye out for this
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