Bernard Lovell Actually!

[dave walsh]

Having repeated about 10% of its brilliant output endlessly over the last few years [presumably to save money and for the management to pretend it's about austerity] BBC4 has got around to the Time Watch Documentary "How Britain Won The Space Race" [if only] tonight!

It's really all about Bernard Lovell. I collected the whole series of books about him from the eighties and still have them. He wanted to just play cricket until he went to a lecture about astronomy and reminds me of the Author Alan Garner who lives in the same area. Re-cycling Battleship parts to create a Radio Telescope is some achievement in itself but Bernard was quite well connected, picking up a quarter of a million pounds worth of ex Radar Equipment for next to nothing just after the war to study Meteor Showers before he aqquired the gun bearings for his Telescope.

I seem to remember that Forum commentators were not so impressed by an apparently in-authentic presentation when it was Broadcast the first time around but that always happens I thought I'd mention the history before the program gets discovered again or in case it doesn't. Even with the flaws, it's existence is a real achievement-just like Jodrell Bank. The person who tried to shut down Alan Turin [see The Imitation Game] got a very critical mention in the Guardian this weekend and this was the same mindset that sought to discredit Lovell. They did all seem to be in the same social group however-although maybe I've got that wrong Enjoy.

Dave W

[fetteler]

Turing?



Gotta Love Jodrell bank though and all it stands for

Steve

PS Turing and Lovell.... Well gotta love Manchester too!!

[Radio Wrangler]

I read Lovell's autobiography some years ago. It came over that he wasn't interested in politics, it was something he had to do to get the radio astronomy thing going. It was about the astronomy and the workings of the equipment he wrote most passionately about. In other words, our sort of guy.

Jodrell Bank's main competitor also has an interesting history. 'Taffy' Bowen was deeply involved in wartime RADAR, IFF, and instrument landing systems. When peace broke out, he seemed to find things relatively boring and went looking for something to do. That something was Australia and he started what turned into Parkes observatory. With a limited budget he wanted the biggest dish he could get for the amount of steel he could afford. He talked his pal Barnes Wallis to go out and design the structure for him.

David

[dave walsh]

Yes I often make that "Italianate" typo Steve-maybe because it's pronounced like the city. You're right when you say that Manchester is not at all short of Scientific pioneers. Turing died unappreciated. If the unexpected launch of Sputnik had not elevated Sir Bernard from facing disgrace to a national hero, I wonder what might have happened there? He was certainly under very great pressure from the establishmen until the satellite launch! Fortunately a Radio Telescope with a 250' dish couldn't be kept under wraps for half a century. unlike Bletchley Park.

I didn't know about that Parkes Observatory link David.

Dave W

[dave walsh]

Coincidentally [I think] tomorrow nights Horizon on BBC2 is "Strange Signals From Outer Space" Frank Drake onwards!

Dave

[SteveCG]

Both Sir Bernard Lovell and Sir Martin Ryle were at the TRE (Telecommunications Research Establishment based at Malvern Worcs. from 1942 onwards) during the Second World War. Sir B. went on to establish JB, Sir Martin went on to establish the Radio Astronomy Group in the Physics Department (Cavendish Laboratory) at Cambridge University. Dr J.S. Hey of TRE stayed on there and developed radio-astronomy there for quite a few years.

TRE was a bit of deliberate misnomer as it specialised in Radar. However Wynn-Williams of TRE was involved in the Colossus work at Bletchley Park, and his son Gareth did Radio-Astronomy at Cambridge. So there are quite a few 'connections' between places.

And for those, like me, find the BBC's iPlayer search a bit odd I found it...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode...d-jodrell-bank

In fact all of the Timeshift programmes available are a very good watch. I use get_iplayer to download them so I can watch on the telly rather than the laptop.

[HamishBoxer]

I had Tuesday's prog all ready down to record or timeshift and I look forward.

['LIVEWIRE?']

When I first read the opening post of this thread, I thought the programme was on tonight (Monday 15th.) as the time given was 'Today - i.e. Monday 12.06AM', only to discover that it was actually broadcast late on Sunday evening. Another one to catch via the I-player, although i have seen it before. BTW I gather people will soon have to have a password and log on to use the I-player?

[dave walsh]

Yes by October. They say it's to improve customer service which seems to amount to using the info to decide what we like to watch-the opposite of the original Reithian objective ie introducing us to something we didn't know we liked.

I've registered but they didn't recognise my e-mail at first. You have to prove a license. I suspect it's actually to enhance the income stream [only £300 million already] and sell content world wide.

As a license holder/stakeholder/shareholder or whatever [actually only a license payer] I would prefer to spread the word for free but there is no consultation on issues like this with the people who fund the Beeb......that's us by the way

Dave W

[AC/HL]

It's to try to reduce free loading by non-licence payers, amongst other things. The fact is recorded, for those who weren't aware, but BBC policy is OT for the Forum.

[SteveCG]

As a post-script to my comment no. 6:

Jodrell Bank now uses one of the old Radio-Astronomy dishes at TRE/RRE/RSRE's outstation at Defford as part of its eMerlin network. Also JB has a purpose built dish at the Cambridge Radio Astronomy site at Lord's Bridge - again part of eMerlin. So the connections between the sites and the people are multiple !

[G6Tanuki]

Originally Posted by SteveCG

Both Sir Bernard Lovell and Sir Martin Ryle were at the TRE (Telecommunications Research Establishment based at Malvern Worcs. from 1942 onwards) during the Second World War. Sir B. went on to establish JB, Sir Martin went on to establish the Radio Astronomy Group in the Physics Department (Cavendish Laboratory) at Cambridge University. Dr J.S. Hey of TRE stayed on there and developed radio-astronomy there for quite a few years.

TRE was a bit of deliberate misnomer as it specialised in Radar. However Wynn-Williams of TRE was involved in the Colossus work at Bletchley Park, and his son Gareth did Radio-Astronomy at Cambridge. So there are quite a few 'connections' between places.

I remember someone a few decades ago suggesting that Sir Bernard Lovell was the inspiration behind the character Professor Bernard Quatermass (who we all remember spent a lot of time Experimenting and doing things in a Pit back in the mid/late-1950s).

]Whatever became of his British Experimental Rocket Group? Didn't they get moved out to the Woomera test-ranges in Australia?]

[paulsherwin]

I did once meet Lovell at a JB open day when I was about 10. I was convinced I wanted to be an astrophysicist at the time and he gave some very good advice, including that the subject involves an awful lot of advanced mathematics (my maths was and is relatively weak). Needless to say I didn't become an astrophysicist.

From what I remember he was a nice friendly chap, though with a touch of the 'mad scientist' about him.

[dave walsh]

Yes the genial eccentric, I can well believe the Quatermass story. When you look at his interviews though there is a similar underlying directness and clarity of thought, coupled with resistance to the powers that be! The contemporary comparison that springs to my mind is the Brain Surgeon Henry Marsh [now on his second autobiographical book] and the bane of the "management".

I think that reference to the Merlin Network will be the Inferometer Chain
designed to make a RT "the size of a planet" [not a brain as in Hitch Hikers]. In that sense Jodrell and Bernard Lovell are still winning in the "Space Race" [so called].

Dave W

[trh01uk]

Originally Posted by SteveCG

Both Sir Bernard Lovell and Sir Martin Ryle were at the TRE (Telecommunications Research Establishment based at Malvern Worcs. from 1942 onwards) during the Second World War. Sir B. went on to establish JB, Sir Martin went on to establish the Radio Astronomy Group in the Physics Department (Cavendish Laboratory) at Cambridge University. Dr J.S. Hey of TRE stayed on there and developed radio-astronomy there for quite a few years.

TRE was a bit of deliberate misnomer as it specialised in Radar. However Wynn-Williams of TRE was involved in the Colossus work at Bletchley Park, and his son Gareth did Radio-Astronomy at Cambridge. So there are quite a few 'connections' between places.

Quite. While Bletchley Park gets all the glory, my assessment was that the code-breakers were distinctly useful during WWII, but the radar guys at TRE were critical to the outcome. Without their work, the Battle of Britain would have been won by the Germans, and the war would have ended remarkably quickly (well for the UK), with the Germans invading. Who knows where things would have gone from there onwards? We'd probably be writing this forum in German now.....

Richard

[paulsherwin]

Can we try to stay reasonably on topic please. Possible outcomes of the Battle of Britain should be discussed elsewhere.

I watched it last night, a proper programme with facts and things.

[Bazz4CQJ]

I have become increasingly uncertain about the accuracy and reliability of TV science programmes, even on the Beeb. This is particularly true of "dramatised" accounts of scientific events. Worst ever offender in this category is the BBC's dramatised account of Richard Feynman's role in the inquiry in to the loss of the Space Shuttle. It presents a very distorted story, as compared with that in Feynman's own book. This term "alternative facts" is no laughing matter. Making programmes that are entertaining and can be sold overseas is an issue which exerts influence.

B

I have become increasingly uncertain about the accuracy and reliability of TV science programmes

So have I, that is one (of the many) reason I liked the programme, it had facts and things. Even the Sky at Night had a "later in the programme" (or was it show?) bit in their 60th anniversary programme.

It may be a misconception of programme producers that "we" have a short attention span and have to whet our appetite first.