0:00:29 > 0:00:32On a bleak day in December 1945,
0:00:32 > 0:00:36one determined man towed a trailer of ex-Army equipment
0:00:36 > 0:00:38into a muddy field in Cheshire.
0:00:40 > 0:00:43The place was called Jodrell Bank
0:00:43 > 0:00:46and it would be here, experimenting with surplus radar kit,
0:00:46 > 0:00:49that he would accidentally find
0:00:49 > 0:00:51distant radio waves coming from space.
0:00:55 > 0:00:56They were basically mapping out
0:00:56 > 0:00:59something you couldn't see with your eyes.
0:01:06 > 0:01:11This Heath Robinson figure built contraptions of increasing complexity
0:01:11 > 0:01:15in order to listen to the heavens at the dawn of the space age.
0:01:17 > 0:01:21Of course, everybody was wondering what on earth is it going to be?
0:01:21 > 0:01:25Yet, in 12 years time, he would be standing in the same field
0:01:25 > 0:01:28in the shadow of the world's largest radio telescope.
0:01:30 > 0:01:35This strange vegetable was starting to sprout out of the Cheshire plain.
0:01:38 > 0:01:42This was the only instrument in the Western world capable of tracking
0:01:42 > 0:01:47both Soviet and American rockets at the height of the Cold War.
0:01:48 > 0:01:52Three, two, one, zero.
0:01:52 > 0:01:55Here's Jodrell Bank working for both the Americans and the Russians,
0:01:55 > 0:01:59tracking their material, and both sides knowing it's happening.
0:01:59 > 0:02:00I think it might have been
0:02:00 > 0:02:03just about the only thing that was remotely like that.
0:02:03 > 0:02:06But the pioneering work of Bernard Lovell
0:02:06 > 0:02:08wouldn't be defined by the Cold War.
0:02:08 > 0:02:11His telescope at Jodrell Bank would be at the forefront
0:02:11 > 0:02:13of a scientific revolution.
0:02:13 > 0:02:16He was a real scientist.
0:02:16 > 0:02:21If there was some scientific mystery which he could tackle,
0:02:21 > 0:02:23he was going to do it.
0:02:23 > 0:02:25The solution to one such mystery
0:02:25 > 0:02:28would redraw the known map of the universe
0:02:28 > 0:02:32and lie behind the most mind-bending discovery of the 20th century.
0:02:33 > 0:02:36That everything began in a big bang.
0:02:38 > 0:02:40So who was Bernard Lovell?
0:02:40 > 0:02:44And how did he put Britain at the forefront of the space race
0:02:44 > 0:02:46and the search for a new understanding
0:02:46 > 0:02:48of our place in the universe?
0:03:05 > 0:03:08It's a weekend in September 1959
0:03:08 > 0:03:10and Bernard Lovell is playing cricket.
0:03:10 > 0:03:14For Lovell, every Saturday was reserved for the game.
0:03:14 > 0:03:19He was captain of the local First XI, so missing a match wasn't an option.
0:03:19 > 0:03:22But this wasn't an average day
0:03:22 > 0:03:24because the Russians had launched a rocket to the moon
0:03:24 > 0:03:28and only Lovell's telescope could verify its landing.
0:03:29 > 0:03:32TRANSLATION FROM RUSSIAN:
0:03:52 > 0:03:55If the Russians' calculations were correct, their rocket would be
0:03:55 > 0:03:59the first man-made object to hit another celestial body.
0:04:00 > 0:04:04At the time, both the United States and the Soviet Union were obsessed
0:04:04 > 0:04:06with getting a rocket to the moon.
0:04:06 > 0:04:08It was hard for the Americans to admit
0:04:08 > 0:04:12that the Russian space programme was more advanced than their own.
0:04:12 > 0:04:16This led to rumours that the Soviets were somehow faking it.
0:04:18 > 0:04:22But neither side had any instrument capable of tracking their own rocket.
0:04:25 > 0:04:27So Lovell's new radio telescope,
0:04:27 > 0:04:29in the heart of the Cheshire countryside,
0:04:29 > 0:04:32was forced to play independent adjudicator
0:04:32 > 0:04:35at the very beginning of the space race.
0:04:41 > 0:04:44It was only after the cricket had a break for tea
0:04:44 > 0:04:47that Lovell engaged with this unfolding drama.
0:04:47 > 0:04:51Calling Jodrell Bank from a telephone box near the ground,
0:04:51 > 0:04:54he learned that he and his telescope were being summoned
0:04:54 > 0:04:58by both sides to confirm the events taking place.
0:05:04 > 0:05:07After finishing the match, he returned to the telescope,
0:05:07 > 0:05:09still in his whites, to a telex from Moscow
0:05:09 > 0:05:12giving the precise frequencies and time
0:05:12 > 0:05:15of the lunar impact for the Russian probe.
0:05:17 > 0:05:19He was at Jodrell in the evening
0:05:19 > 0:05:22by which time the Russians had sent all the data necessary for him
0:05:22 > 0:05:25to track this rocket as it approached the moon.
0:05:25 > 0:05:29But in-between, he was going to play cricket, and that was the balance.
0:05:31 > 0:05:34By Sunday, the world's press assembled at Jodrell Bank
0:05:34 > 0:05:38to listen, as the signals from the probe ceased,
0:05:38 > 0:05:41indicating that the Russians had hit the moon.
0:05:46 > 0:05:48HISSING AND BEEPS
0:05:54 > 0:05:57What we just heard were the signals from Lunik 2,
0:05:57 > 0:06:01recorded...picked up by the Lovell telescope here,
0:06:01 > 0:06:05recorded on 13 September 1959,
0:06:05 > 0:06:07and played back as a sound.
0:06:07 > 0:06:10The beeps effectively are the signal coming from the spacecraft.
0:06:10 > 0:06:12And when they stop,
0:06:12 > 0:06:16we'd actually tracked the spacecraft right down onto the moon.
0:06:16 > 0:06:18So it was possible to show
0:06:18 > 0:06:21that the Russians had sent the spacecraft to the moon.
0:06:21 > 0:06:23It was the first ever spacecraft to hit the moon,
0:06:23 > 0:06:27to actually reach the surface of another celestial body.
0:06:33 > 0:06:36How did this unlikely figure come to find himself
0:06:36 > 0:06:39at the epicentre of a new age?
0:06:39 > 0:06:41The son of a lay preacher and a shopkeeper,
0:06:41 > 0:06:45Bernard Lovell had not considered the prospect of a life in science
0:06:45 > 0:06:47until, as an impressionable schoolboy,
0:06:47 > 0:06:51he was taken to a lecture by the eminent physicist AM Tyndall.
0:06:51 > 0:06:53When he was a young boy,
0:06:53 > 0:06:57in a village school, and in his own words,
0:06:57 > 0:07:01I remember them very clearly, he said, "I was not a good student."
0:07:01 > 0:07:05In other words, precocious intelligence not being stretched.
0:07:05 > 0:07:10And he was taken to Bristol, and he walked into a lecture theatre
0:07:10 > 0:07:13and he described to me the two globes
0:07:13 > 0:07:18and the electric spark that was made to jump between them.
0:07:18 > 0:07:20# I put a spell on you
0:07:25 > 0:07:27# Cos you're mine... #
0:07:27 > 0:07:30And he talked in really vivid terms
0:07:30 > 0:07:33about the colour of the sparks in the room
0:07:33 > 0:07:35and the sound of the arc lamps
0:07:35 > 0:07:38and the smell of the electrical discharge
0:07:38 > 0:07:40and the scorching of the air across the room.
0:07:43 > 0:07:46I found him quite enchanting and bewildered,
0:07:46 > 0:07:51and from that time I had a really great ambition to go to university.
0:07:51 > 0:07:55MUSIC: Moonlight Serenade by The Glenn Miller Orchestra
0:07:57 > 0:08:01But in 1939, this idealistic young scientist,
0:08:01 > 0:08:03like many others of his generation,
0:08:03 > 0:08:06was wrenched from his fledgling research position
0:08:06 > 0:08:10in the Physics department and thrown into wartime work.
0:08:14 > 0:08:20The aspect of Father's work that is generally regarded
0:08:20 > 0:08:24as critical to the Allied war effort was
0:08:24 > 0:08:30the development by his team of the short-wavelength radar
0:08:30 > 0:08:34that enabled the war against the U-boats in the Atlantic
0:08:34 > 0:08:38to be carried on successfully at night.
0:08:41 > 0:08:45Lovell's new short-wavelength radar allowed Allied night bombers
0:08:45 > 0:08:50to bounce radio waves off U-boats as they surfaced to refuel at night.
0:08:50 > 0:08:54This revealed their positions and left them vulnerable to attack.
0:08:54 > 0:08:57Britain was being starved to death
0:08:57 > 0:09:00by the success of the U-boat attacks on the convoys
0:09:00 > 0:09:03and Father's team was instrumental
0:09:03 > 0:09:06in turning the tide of the battle in the Atlantic.
0:09:06 > 0:09:09During the war, Lovell was in charge of a team of scientists
0:09:09 > 0:09:12who developed an entirely new technology
0:09:12 > 0:09:16at a speed that would have made Steve Jobs' head spin.
0:09:16 > 0:09:18He made things work
0:09:18 > 0:09:21which nobody would have dreamed of before the war.
0:09:21 > 0:09:27So that he learnt a lot of radio engineering,
0:09:27 > 0:09:30but he also learnt about how to run a big project.
0:09:30 > 0:09:34The wartime work made Lovell understand pressure
0:09:34 > 0:09:38and how to get things done with limited time and resources.
0:09:38 > 0:09:41So, at the end of the war, with great relief, he was able to return
0:09:41 > 0:09:46with new drive to his great passion for pure science.
0:09:46 > 0:09:49Lovell had become intrigued by the possibility
0:09:49 > 0:09:53that radar might be used to do more than find Nazi U-boats.
0:09:53 > 0:09:56So, when he returned to Manchester in 1945,
0:09:56 > 0:10:01he came with an Army trailer full of now defunct radar equipment.
0:10:01 > 0:10:03All he needed was a quiet patch of land
0:10:03 > 0:10:08far away from the noise of the city to set up his radar and start work.
0:10:08 > 0:10:11Father went to Jodrell for the first time to see if it would
0:10:11 > 0:10:17be suitable and had his Army trailer delivered there in December '45.
0:10:17 > 0:10:22And the events I'm describing must have been very, very early in 1946.
0:10:22 > 0:10:23There was nobody there, just my father,
0:10:23 > 0:10:25nobody else was on the staff at Jodrell.
0:10:32 > 0:10:35Jodrell Bank was a few acres of field
0:10:35 > 0:10:37belonging to the university's Botany department
0:10:37 > 0:10:40in the heart of Cheshire's countryside.
0:10:42 > 0:10:47One of Lovell's early research projects was the study of meteors.
0:10:47 > 0:10:50He wanted to prove that what you could see in the night sky
0:10:50 > 0:10:54with your eyes was echoed by what he could see on his radar.
0:11:02 > 0:11:04# Mr Sandman... #
0:11:04 > 0:11:06In this early work at Jodrell Bank,
0:11:06 > 0:11:10Lovell was joined by keen amateur astronomer Manning Prentice,
0:11:10 > 0:11:14who, on clear winter nights, would lie in a deck chair studying
0:11:14 > 0:11:18the night sky with his binoculars, shouting his observations to Lovell.
0:11:20 > 0:11:24I was allowed, as an early treat - I must only have been about six -
0:11:24 > 0:11:28to go, to be wrapped up with every sweater I had,
0:11:28 > 0:11:34and be allowed to go and sit in another deckchair
0:11:34 > 0:11:36next to Mr Prentice
0:11:36 > 0:11:39and be there during the night,
0:11:39 > 0:11:41far, far, far beyond bedtime,
0:11:41 > 0:11:44while Manning Prentice would bellow out
0:11:44 > 0:11:47the coordinates of his observations.
0:11:47 > 0:11:51And inside the trailer, simultaneously, there would be
0:11:51 > 0:11:55the team picking up the reflections from these meteor trails.
0:11:57 > 0:11:59Lovell's enthusiasm doubled
0:11:59 > 0:12:04when this research unequivocally linked radio echoes with meteors,
0:12:04 > 0:12:07proving that astronomy could be done by using radar.
0:12:07 > 0:12:11This pioneering research quickly drew eager young graduate students
0:12:11 > 0:12:13to the fields of Jodrell Bank
0:12:13 > 0:12:16to build their own radio-detection devices.
0:12:16 > 0:12:20And the place started to look like some kind of strange fairground.
0:12:27 > 0:12:31Post-war period, there was lots of ex-Army equipment
0:12:31 > 0:12:33that was being dumped into mineshafts.
0:12:33 > 0:12:36So they actually drove around the country with a truck,
0:12:36 > 0:12:39piling as much of the electronics in the back as they could.
0:12:39 > 0:12:42It was very much a sort of Heath Robinson
0:12:42 > 0:12:44sort of seat-of-the-pants affair, where people would
0:12:44 > 0:12:47build their own kit out of whatever they had to hand.
0:12:47 > 0:12:49# Mr Sandman, someone to hold... #
0:12:49 > 0:12:52We children were involved in this.
0:12:52 > 0:12:56"Here's a piece of wire, this is a parabola.
0:12:56 > 0:12:59"You're going to put a wire in the centre of it and help us
0:12:59 > 0:13:01"listen to radio waves from space."
0:13:01 > 0:13:05Which, looking back, was a slightly odd thing for a five-year-old
0:13:05 > 0:13:09to be told, but it was interesting, sure it was interesting.
0:13:09 > 0:13:12It was a lot more fun than going to the park.
0:13:13 > 0:13:15There was a very good camaraderie
0:13:15 > 0:13:18amongst quite a small group of people.
0:13:18 > 0:13:20And they just made things work.
0:13:20 > 0:13:25It was a very great privilege, really, to be involved in that.
0:13:27 > 0:13:31Lovell and his team quickly realised that the success they were having
0:13:31 > 0:13:35from their tangle of wires and aerials would be greatly enhanced
0:13:35 > 0:13:37if they could connect their wires together
0:13:37 > 0:13:41and stretch them across the field to create a larger collecting area,
0:13:41 > 0:13:45able to pick up weaker signals from more distant stars.
0:13:45 > 0:13:47But this early radio telescope couldn't move,
0:13:47 > 0:13:52it just picked up radio waves from the stars as the sky moved overhead.
0:13:54 > 0:13:57So he built a very large radio telescope,
0:13:57 > 0:14:02as we now call it, by stretching wires in the form of a dish
0:14:02 > 0:14:06and holding them up with scaffold poles.
0:14:07 > 0:14:09It was quite a job to build it,
0:14:09 > 0:14:11which they did, with their own hands.
0:14:13 > 0:14:17The diameter of the bowl was determined by the distance
0:14:17 > 0:14:20between the hedge of the farmer's field
0:14:20 > 0:14:22and the truck, the Army truck,
0:14:22 > 0:14:26that they had their equipment in, that had been dragged into the field
0:14:26 > 0:14:29some years before and had just sunk up to its axles in the mud.
0:14:29 > 0:14:31So that determined the size of the telescope,
0:14:31 > 0:14:33that's why it's 218 foot.
0:14:33 > 0:14:36So this was all very, you know, seat-of-the-pants stuff,
0:14:36 > 0:14:39really great pioneering work.
0:14:39 > 0:14:42My only personal memory of it
0:14:42 > 0:14:47is being driven past it by my father
0:14:47 > 0:14:52and seeing what seemed to be a tangled mess of chicken wire
0:14:52 > 0:14:58with some kind of latticework girder poking into the sky.
0:14:58 > 0:15:00And my father said,
0:15:00 > 0:15:05"That's some rum kind of thing for looking at things."
0:15:06 > 0:15:10In 1950, using this contraption, two of Lovell's colleagues,
0:15:10 > 0:15:15Hanbury Brown and Cyril Hazard, made the first detection of radio waves
0:15:15 > 0:15:18from the nearby Andromeda galaxy.
0:15:18 > 0:15:22This was a revolutionary discovery, revealing that other galaxies,
0:15:22 > 0:15:25besides our own Milky Way, emitted radio waves.
0:15:25 > 0:15:29This new astronomy effectively remapped the universe.
0:15:29 > 0:15:33I mean, for thousands of years, people will have looked at the skies
0:15:33 > 0:15:36just using their eyes, so looked at the stars overhead,
0:15:36 > 0:15:40the moon, the planets, and they even built structures, you know,
0:15:40 > 0:15:44Stonehenge and others, associated with what happens in the sky.
0:15:44 > 0:15:49400 years ago or so, Galileo was one of the first to use a telescope.
0:15:49 > 0:15:52So a telescope basically just enhances the view
0:15:52 > 0:15:55that your eye gives you. It collects more light, it zooms in on things.
0:15:55 > 0:15:59But all that involved visible light, the stuff your eye can see.
0:15:59 > 0:16:01Radio astronomy worked differently,
0:16:01 > 0:16:05opening up a view of the invisible universe.
0:16:08 > 0:16:10They were basically mapping out
0:16:10 > 0:16:11something you couldn't see with your eyes.
0:16:11 > 0:16:15So they were starting to pick up bright sources of radio waves
0:16:15 > 0:16:19and then having to go and compare them to what we already knew.
0:16:19 > 0:16:22And quite often, there was nothing there in the existing map.
0:16:22 > 0:16:24And that was one of the great stories
0:16:24 > 0:16:26of those early years of radio astronomy,
0:16:26 > 0:16:30pinning down what these new radio sources were in the sky.
0:16:37 > 0:16:41Lovell's contemporary, the celebrated cosmologist Fred Hoyle,
0:16:41 > 0:16:44was particularly excited about the science of radio astronomy
0:16:44 > 0:16:47and the possibilities it was opening up.
0:16:47 > 0:16:50Its scope and reach was mind-boggling.
0:16:51 > 0:16:54What radio astronomy has done is to give us
0:16:54 > 0:16:58an extra window through which to look out at the universe.
0:17:01 > 0:17:03This new view might allow astronomers
0:17:03 > 0:17:06to look right back to the beginning of time.
0:17:06 > 0:17:10But Hoyle himself didn't believe the universe had a beginning.
0:17:10 > 0:17:13He was a leading advocate for steady-state theory,
0:17:13 > 0:17:17the idea that the universe was in a process of continuous creation.
0:17:17 > 0:17:20Today, we can peer far into the depths of space and see
0:17:20 > 0:17:24some of the many millions of island universes we call galaxies.
0:17:27 > 0:17:29Were they all created in a moment of time?
0:17:29 > 0:17:32The fragments of a tremendous explosion?
0:17:32 > 0:17:34Or is creation continuous
0:17:34 > 0:17:38in a universe that had no beginning and will have no end?
0:17:43 > 0:17:47Steady-state theory were pushing those who believed in the big bang
0:17:47 > 0:17:50to find evidence to back up their claim.
0:17:50 > 0:17:54The debate spanned the era, and while an answer would eventually come,
0:17:54 > 0:17:58these were the very biggest questions.
0:17:58 > 0:18:02Once you're in this, once you understand what the questions are,
0:18:02 > 0:18:06and start thinking in those terms, you can't ever stop.
0:18:10 > 0:18:13Bernard Lovell was fuelled by the exciting debates
0:18:13 > 0:18:16arising in astronomy and was becoming increasingly obsessed
0:18:16 > 0:18:20by the possibilities the research at Jodrell bank was throwing up.
0:18:20 > 0:18:22Their DIY telescope had proved its worth,
0:18:22 > 0:18:27but what Lovell really wanted was a telescope of epic proportions,
0:18:27 > 0:18:31one that could move to look at any part of the sky.
0:18:31 > 0:18:33He believed that if he could achieve this dream,
0:18:33 > 0:18:37it would change human understanding of the universe.
0:18:37 > 0:18:40They were just so determined that
0:18:40 > 0:18:44if they could build a steerable thing like this,
0:18:44 > 0:18:48it would be bound to be picking up some interesting things,
0:18:48 > 0:18:51but they couldn't say what they were going to be.
0:18:51 > 0:18:52They were right, of course.
0:18:58 > 0:19:03In 1950, Lovell met Sheffield-based engineer Charles Husband.
0:19:03 > 0:19:06Husband jumped at the opportunity to build something new,
0:19:06 > 0:19:10and construction tenders went out in June of that year.
0:19:16 > 0:19:20When Husband came to Jodrell to talk to Lovell, he said,
0:19:20 > 0:19:24"Well, that's really only rather like a bridge
0:19:24 > 0:19:26"with a moving piece on top.
0:19:26 > 0:19:29"So let's just see if we can't design it."
0:19:29 > 0:19:32And you have to realise that in those days
0:19:32 > 0:19:37there was no computer at all, no question of computer-aided design,
0:19:37 > 0:19:42it was all done with a slide rule and pen and pencil.
0:19:42 > 0:19:45It was a marriage of ambitious engineering
0:19:45 > 0:19:47with cutting-edge science.
0:19:47 > 0:19:51They were sort of two like minds in a way - Lovell was driven by
0:19:51 > 0:19:54the pure research, Husband was a sort of, you know,
0:19:54 > 0:19:56go-for-it sort of engineer
0:19:56 > 0:19:59who really felt that he could build such a thing.
0:19:59 > 0:20:05Nobody had ever tried to build a device of this size
0:20:05 > 0:20:08that would operate with the precision of a watch.
0:20:08 > 0:20:10Nobody had done that before.
0:20:10 > 0:20:11They'd done it with small things,
0:20:11 > 0:20:14but they'd never done it with anything like that size.
0:20:14 > 0:20:16It was a huge engineering leap.
0:20:16 > 0:20:18There weren't prototypes,
0:20:18 > 0:20:22there was just the first fully steerable large radio telescope.
0:20:22 > 0:20:26A strange structure began to grow out of the Cheshire fields,
0:20:26 > 0:20:28bemusing the local community.
0:20:30 > 0:20:33If we stood there we could see across the trees
0:20:33 > 0:20:40and could see it coming higher and higher gradually. And...
0:20:42 > 0:20:46..of course everybody was wondering what an earth it's going to be?
0:20:48 > 0:20:53There's strange vegetables starting to sprout out of the Cheshire plain.
0:20:55 > 0:20:58In order to get his new telescope built,
0:20:58 > 0:21:01Lovell needed support, and lots of it.
0:21:01 > 0:21:03People had to be persuaded that it's a good idea.
0:21:03 > 0:21:05The university had to be persuaded,
0:21:05 > 0:21:08the people who funded the university had to be persuaded,
0:21:08 > 0:21:10the government department that funded scientific projects
0:21:10 > 0:21:12had to be persuaded,
0:21:12 > 0:21:15so all those had to be
0:21:15 > 0:21:20essentially lobbied to, very skilfully,
0:21:20 > 0:21:23in order to persuade them to part
0:21:23 > 0:21:26with what was an almost unprecedented amount of money
0:21:26 > 0:21:29for an astronomical project in Britain.
0:21:29 > 0:21:32We shall require a radio telescope
0:21:32 > 0:21:35with a diameter of at least 250 feet.
0:21:35 > 0:21:38That is the smallest and cheapest instrument
0:21:38 > 0:21:39which will serve our purpose.
0:21:40 > 0:21:42APPLAUSE
0:21:42 > 0:21:45Lovell was harnessing an enthusiasm for radio astronomy
0:21:45 > 0:21:48that had been fostered at the Festival of Britain.
0:21:52 > 0:21:56On top of the old shop tower there's the latest radar equipment.
0:22:00 > 0:22:03This national exhibition organised by the government gave
0:22:03 > 0:22:07the public a feeling of recovery after the war by showcasing
0:22:07 > 0:22:10the very best of British science and technology
0:22:10 > 0:22:14and Jodrell Bank made an important contribution.
0:22:14 > 0:22:17The fact that the centrepiece of the Festival of Britain is
0:22:17 > 0:22:19the Dome of Discovery,
0:22:19 > 0:22:22which is an exhibition that centres on the national contribution
0:22:22 > 0:22:28that science and engineering makes, as part of a national story,
0:22:28 > 0:22:32the fact that nine million people attended that exhibition...
0:22:32 > 0:22:34In fact, at that exhibition
0:22:34 > 0:22:37they saw radio telescopes being part of that story.
0:22:37 > 0:22:42Well, that means radio astronomy is already part of that public image
0:22:42 > 0:22:44of science in post-war Britain.
0:22:44 > 0:22:48Participating in the Festival of Britain was a savvy move.
0:22:48 > 0:22:52It excited the visiting public with the new science of radio astronomy
0:22:52 > 0:22:55and was something the promoters of British science
0:22:55 > 0:22:56could really get behind.
0:22:56 > 0:23:00It's a good example of how Lovell can be extremely canny
0:23:00 > 0:23:04in presenting different audiences with different arguments
0:23:04 > 0:23:10for why Britain needs a giant steerable radio telescope.
0:23:18 > 0:23:19Throughout the 1950s,
0:23:19 > 0:23:23the construction of the telescope progressed steadily,
0:23:23 > 0:23:25but costs were escalating.
0:23:40 > 0:23:44The telescope began to go over budget which began to have
0:23:44 > 0:23:49quite an impact on domestic affairs in the family home.
0:23:50 > 0:23:55The original cost estimate they put together at the end of the 1940s,
0:23:55 > 0:24:00early 1950s, was £120,000, and in the end it cost about £750,000.
0:24:05 > 0:24:08Sir Bernard had a great deal of trouble to get the thing up
0:24:08 > 0:24:13and it's a well-known fact that he reached a stage of being on
0:24:13 > 0:24:17the point of criminal bankruptcy, personal trouble for him.
0:24:28 > 0:24:31This was public money that Lovell was spending.
0:24:31 > 0:24:34His project began to cut scorn as
0:24:34 > 0:24:37Parliament's Public Accounts Committee
0:24:37 > 0:24:40mounted a formal enquiry into the telescope.
0:24:40 > 0:24:44The Public Accounts Committee could criticise
0:24:44 > 0:24:48the spending of government departments in such a way that
0:24:48 > 0:24:49whatever they said,
0:24:49 > 0:24:52their criticism had to be listened to very carefully.
0:24:52 > 0:24:55To be censored by the Public Accounts Committee
0:24:55 > 0:24:57was an immense shame for a government department.
0:25:04 > 0:25:06The government tried to counter the bad press
0:25:06 > 0:25:10by commissioning a documentary film about the project.
0:25:10 > 0:25:14It was to be a propaganda piece for the telescope showing both
0:25:14 > 0:25:18the British public and the wider world what an engineering achievement
0:25:18 > 0:25:23this was and how important this new astronomy would be in the future.
0:25:23 > 0:25:26The script was a carefully worded offence
0:25:26 > 0:25:28against Parliamentary criticism,
0:25:28 > 0:25:32shot in a very terse style, topped off with some wooden acting.
0:25:32 > 0:25:34Well, yes, of course that's what I really want.
0:25:34 > 0:25:38A fully steerable telescope with a bowl about 250 in diameter.
0:25:38 > 0:25:42But everyone says the engineering isn't too great.
0:25:42 > 0:25:45Why, I don't know. The problem isn't entirely new.
0:25:45 > 0:25:49Large swing vehicles and big dock side cranes
0:25:49 > 0:25:51have many of the same features.
0:25:51 > 0:25:58In the film what you see is very carefully stage managed dialogue
0:25:58 > 0:26:01between the scientists and the engineers.
0:26:09 > 0:26:11But it wasn't a British government film
0:26:11 > 0:26:13that would save Lovell and his telescope.
0:26:13 > 0:26:16The miracle would come in the form of a small satellite
0:26:16 > 0:26:20launched into orbit by a Soviet rocket in October 1957.
0:26:20 > 0:26:24It must have been a school day morning,
0:26:24 > 0:26:27I think it was a Friday in October,
0:26:27 > 0:26:29and there was a tremendous kerfuffle
0:26:29 > 0:26:31in the early hours, and bells ringing.
0:26:31 > 0:26:34There was a telephone in the hall at home which just about woke you up.
0:26:34 > 0:26:36PHONE RINGS
0:26:36 > 0:26:38Charles Husband had telephoned and said,
0:26:38 > 0:26:42"Why don't you get Jodrell involved in this Sputnik?
0:26:42 > 0:26:44"It will help us with our financial troubles."
0:26:44 > 0:26:49We were saying, "Yeah, why don't you tune into Sputnik?"
0:26:49 > 0:26:52And he said, "Because it's easy, anybody can do it."
0:26:54 > 0:26:56Lovell wasn't interested in trying to pick up
0:26:56 > 0:26:58the signals from Sputnik itself.
0:26:58 > 0:27:02This sort of beach ball sized satellite that goes ping
0:27:02 > 0:27:04because you could pick up the signals from that
0:27:04 > 0:27:06with any sort of small radio receiver,
0:27:06 > 0:27:10you didn't need a giant radio telescope like this to do it.
0:27:10 > 0:27:13However, the media, the British public all thought that
0:27:13 > 0:27:17somehow Jodrell Bank must be associated with this project
0:27:17 > 0:27:20and they were asking, "What are you doing for Sputnik?"
0:27:20 > 0:27:24And it actually wasn't until he got a call from someone in government
0:27:24 > 0:27:27who pointed out that actually it would be quite interesting if Lovell
0:27:27 > 0:27:31could demonstrate that we could get a radar echo off,
0:27:31 > 0:27:33not off the Sputnik satellite itself,
0:27:33 > 0:27:35but the rocket that had carried Sputnik into space,
0:27:35 > 0:27:38which was itself also orbiting the earth.
0:27:38 > 0:27:40And the reason was because that rocket was an
0:27:40 > 0:27:42intercontinental ballistic missile.
0:27:42 > 0:27:45And of course the next thing, it might launch into space,
0:27:45 > 0:27:48might be something rather more threatening
0:27:48 > 0:27:51than this sort of beach ball sized thing that goes ping.
0:27:54 > 0:27:56Sputnik shocked the Americans.
0:27:56 > 0:27:58They were confident they had bigger
0:27:58 > 0:28:00and better missiles than the Russians.
0:28:00 > 0:28:04But here they were in second place with a big question to answer.
0:28:04 > 0:28:07A couple of months later they tried to do the same thing
0:28:07 > 0:28:08and it blew up on the pad.
0:28:08 > 0:28:11It raised I think about four inches, that's as far as it flew.
0:28:20 > 0:28:24News about Sputnik sent scientists rushing to Jodrell Bank as they knew
0:28:24 > 0:28:25it was the only place
0:28:25 > 0:28:28that had a hope of detecting Sputnik's carrier rocket.
0:28:29 > 0:28:31Everybody came back into work.
0:28:31 > 0:28:34I mean, the whole thing between the 4th of October,
0:28:34 > 0:28:38the following week, everybody was back in.
0:28:38 > 0:28:41They did a few months' work in a matter of a few days.
0:28:44 > 0:28:48Jodrell Bank's radar equipment was being monitored around the clock.
0:28:48 > 0:28:52Lovell and his colleagues were looking for the unmistakable trace
0:28:52 > 0:28:55the Sputnik rocket would produce on their screens.
0:28:55 > 0:28:58This was all very exciting for one schoolboy.
0:28:59 > 0:29:04By the next Saturday night they tracked it, and I was there.
0:29:04 > 0:29:07He says quite correctly in his memoire of this that
0:29:07 > 0:29:09"I pleaded with him to be present."
0:29:09 > 0:29:12I felt I earned it cos I'd been cycling up and down
0:29:12 > 0:29:15with sandwiches and tea from home for all the press
0:29:15 > 0:29:17who by now were everywhere at Jodrell.
0:29:17 > 0:29:19Jodrell had no experience of this.
0:29:19 > 0:29:21There's this place that is in the middle of fields
0:29:21 > 0:29:23in the middle of Cheshire
0:29:23 > 0:29:26and suddenly there's Raymond Baxter on the roof
0:29:26 > 0:29:29talking into a microphone saying this is history being made.
0:29:29 > 0:29:32Everything's going on and I was allowed to go in this hut
0:29:32 > 0:29:37and I saw this echo on the cathode ray tub.
0:29:37 > 0:29:41I can see it now. Incredible.
0:29:41 > 0:29:44A photograph's taken of that cathode ray tube and developed
0:29:44 > 0:29:49and then magnified and projected in front of the assembled media
0:29:49 > 0:29:51and Lovell was basically pointing out the trace,
0:29:51 > 0:29:55the black line that was the flash of the radar echo,
0:29:55 > 0:29:59the pulse beam coming back from the rocket as it orbited the earth.
0:30:01 > 0:30:05Father reports correctly that he did say to me
0:30:05 > 0:30:09"If the sight of that doesn't make you a scientist, nothing will."
0:30:12 > 0:30:15In the early years of the space race,
0:30:15 > 0:30:17Jodrell Bank was the only place in the world with radar
0:30:17 > 0:30:21capable of tracking the first rocket, both Russians and Americans,
0:30:21 > 0:30:23who were launching into space.
0:30:23 > 0:30:26So it was relied on by both superpowers,
0:30:26 > 0:30:29but Lovell's telescope wasn't designed for tracking
0:30:29 > 0:30:32and some of the astronomers on his staff were dubious about giving
0:30:32 > 0:30:34the telescope up for this purpose.
0:30:34 > 0:30:36If you read the original design study
0:30:36 > 0:30:38for the Lovell Telescope, as it was,
0:30:38 > 0:30:41tracking these space missions was not part of the remit.
0:30:41 > 0:30:43We were suppose to be looking at the planets
0:30:43 > 0:30:45and things much farther out in space,
0:30:45 > 0:30:47and of course that work did continue,
0:30:47 > 0:30:50but suddenly this new arena opened up,
0:30:50 > 0:30:53and not only the sort of peaceful use of space,
0:30:53 > 0:30:56but also this great tension between these two superpowers
0:30:56 > 0:31:02and I think Jodrell forged that path between the two.
0:31:06 > 0:31:10I mean, this instrument was so far ahead of its time,
0:31:10 > 0:31:13as an engineering achievement it was astonishing.
0:31:13 > 0:31:18And as a scientific instrument it was uniquely capable of performing
0:31:18 > 0:31:22some of these tasks for both the Russians and the Americans.
0:31:36 > 0:31:39On the one hand, Lovell allowed the US Air Force to base themselves
0:31:39 > 0:31:42at Jodrell Bank to use the telescope for tracking.
0:31:42 > 0:31:43And on the other,
0:31:43 > 0:31:47he invited Russian scientists to search for their space probes.
0:31:47 > 0:31:49Given the political climate working,
0:31:49 > 0:31:52with both sides at the time was totally unorthodox.
0:31:52 > 0:31:56Three, two, one. Zero.
0:31:56 > 0:31:59Here's Jodrell Bank working for both the Americans and the Russians
0:31:59 > 0:32:03tracking their material, and both sides knowing it's happening.
0:32:03 > 0:32:06I think it might have been just about the only thing
0:32:06 > 0:32:07that was remotely like that.
0:32:13 > 0:32:16Space tracking was a big coup for Lovell.
0:32:16 > 0:32:19His collaboration with the Americans in particular
0:32:19 > 0:32:21did much to restore his standing.
0:32:21 > 0:32:24Princess Margaret visited Jodrell Bank to send signals to
0:32:24 > 0:32:28the most successful American satellite, Pioneer 5,
0:32:28 > 0:32:30as it sped out into space.
0:32:30 > 0:32:33This rubber stamp of approval on behalf of the British establishment
0:32:33 > 0:32:36did a lot to ease the pressure on Lovell.
0:32:36 > 0:32:41One wealthy benefactor, Lord Nuffield, a pro-business, staunch
0:32:41 > 0:32:45anti-Communist, was particularly impressed with Lovell's work.
0:32:45 > 0:32:49These various activities, although they were, as I've said,
0:32:49 > 0:32:53a small proportion of the work of the telescope,
0:32:53 > 0:32:55were very important
0:32:55 > 0:32:59and one result was that the funding of the telescope which had
0:32:59 > 0:33:07actually still lagged behind, was completely cleared by Lord Nuffield
0:33:07 > 0:33:11who telephoned Bernard Lovell one day and said,
0:33:11 > 0:33:13"How much more money do you need?"
0:33:13 > 0:33:16And said, "Don't worry, we'll pay that."
0:33:16 > 0:33:20My impression is that Lovell's achievement was fantastic
0:33:20 > 0:33:22given the situation of the country,
0:33:22 > 0:33:25given the fact it was nearly bankrupt, given the fact that
0:33:25 > 0:33:28nobody was interested in doing kind of things like this.
0:33:28 > 0:33:32We were very inward looking, very negative.
0:33:32 > 0:33:35It was a dirty, dark place in those days.
0:33:35 > 0:33:39And I think for him to have collected some of the money together
0:33:39 > 0:33:43and gone at it so hard to do it and get to within, what was it, 50,000,
0:33:43 > 0:33:45that the phone called paid?
0:33:45 > 0:33:46"I'll pay for that." Bingo.
0:33:46 > 0:33:49I mean, it was a brilliant...
0:33:49 > 0:33:54It said a lot I thought for the steely purpose behind that
0:33:54 > 0:33:56charming and obeying exterior.
0:34:20 > 0:34:22By involving himself in the space race,
0:34:22 > 0:34:25Lovell tactically saved the telescope from ruin.
0:34:25 > 0:34:28But in 1962, as the Cold War intensified,
0:34:28 > 0:34:31a confrontation between the United States
0:34:31 > 0:34:34and Russia over Soviet ballistic missiles in Cuba escalated.
0:34:34 > 0:34:37A dramatic standoff between the two superpowers
0:34:37 > 0:34:40brought the world to the brink of nuclear war.
0:34:40 > 0:34:44Lovell's telescope was the only radar system in the UK
0:34:44 > 0:34:46capable of detecting incoming missiles,
0:34:46 > 0:34:48so it became the first line of defence.
0:34:48 > 0:34:51This sent Lovell into a torment of anxiety.
0:34:51 > 0:34:54And at the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis there was a team of
0:34:54 > 0:34:59trained military personal trained to use the telescope
0:34:59 > 0:35:03who were on standby to walk in here into the control room
0:35:03 > 0:35:05to take over at the control desk here
0:35:05 > 0:35:08and to drive the telescope round to point east
0:35:08 > 0:35:09and to send out the radar pulses
0:35:09 > 0:35:12looking for the echoes from the missiles rising.
0:35:12 > 0:35:14And although we could have done nothing about it,
0:35:14 > 0:35:18we couldn't have prevented those missiles from hitting,
0:35:18 > 0:35:24it would have provided that several minutes for some people at least
0:35:24 > 0:35:26to get into the bunkers.
0:35:26 > 0:35:28PHONE RINGS
0:35:34 > 0:35:38A new phone with a green handset appeared on Father's desk in his
0:35:38 > 0:35:44study at home and that phone was not for use for any outgoing calls,
0:35:44 > 0:35:46and certainly not for use by any of us.
0:35:46 > 0:35:51That was the hotline, that was the phone on which Father
0:35:51 > 0:35:57was going to be told to make ready for the telescope to be used by
0:35:57 > 0:36:00the state as part of the western defence
0:36:00 > 0:36:04because a missile strike was considered likely.
0:36:04 > 0:36:06Once again in his career
0:36:06 > 0:36:09Lovell found himself engulfed by the threat of war.
0:36:09 > 0:36:12His scientific work threatened by political forces
0:36:12 > 0:36:14quite beyond his control.
0:36:18 > 0:36:21The Russians then invited him on a state visit
0:36:21 > 0:36:25only a matter of months after the drama of the Cuban Missile Crisis.
0:36:27 > 0:36:31Because Jodrell had this important role in defence,
0:36:31 > 0:36:34Lovell asked whether it was appropriate for him
0:36:34 > 0:36:38to be actually going to the Soviet Union so soon after that.
0:36:38 > 0:36:41And actually nobody seemed to be worried, it was OK,
0:36:41 > 0:36:43it was fine for him to go.
0:36:43 > 0:36:46He went along and the surprising thing was that they actually,
0:36:46 > 0:36:49he was surprised by this, they took him to see
0:36:49 > 0:36:53what was the top secret facilities down on the coast of the Black Sea.
0:36:55 > 0:36:58So he was shown around this whole place.
0:36:58 > 0:37:01And then I think maybe even gently persuaded
0:37:01 > 0:37:05might he consider the possibility of staying.
0:37:05 > 0:37:07They could offer him some money
0:37:07 > 0:37:10to build his own large telescopes there in Russia.
0:37:10 > 0:37:14He didn't want to stay in Russia of course.
0:37:14 > 0:37:18He said he was an Englishman, he wanted to return to England.
0:37:18 > 0:37:20Upon his return, Lovell fell ill.
0:37:20 > 0:37:24Suffering fatigue, headaches, depression and despondency.
0:37:24 > 0:37:28The authorities blamed his mysterious illness on radiation exposure, that
0:37:28 > 0:37:32the Soviets had tried to poison him in an attempt to remove his memories.
0:37:39 > 0:37:42I don't think there was anything in that story,
0:37:42 > 0:37:47but it was an important thing for him.
0:37:51 > 0:37:54I mean, later in life Father rather warmed to the idea
0:37:54 > 0:37:58the KGB had nobbled him, but I don't quite believe that.
0:38:02 > 0:38:07What I do remember is that after years and years of tremendous strain
0:38:07 > 0:38:10in dealing with the telescope and of...
0:38:10 > 0:38:14going through the Cuban Missile Crisis with the telescope
0:38:14 > 0:38:17as an instrument of defence for the west,
0:38:17 > 0:38:23an exhausting trip to Russia, I think Father was just wiped out.
0:38:32 > 0:38:36Rather than a Soviet poisoning conspiracy it seems more likely that
0:38:36 > 0:38:40conflicting moral pressures caused Lovell's breakdown.
0:38:40 > 0:38:41And despite a knighthood
0:38:41 > 0:38:45he considered abandoning his work at Jodrell Bank entirely.
0:38:47 > 0:38:50He had devoted enormous energies,
0:38:50 > 0:38:56long periods of time wading against the currents of ignorance
0:38:56 > 0:39:01to get his dream, his vision made real and concrete
0:39:01 > 0:39:03and operational.
0:39:03 > 0:39:08And he was a pure scientist and when it became
0:39:08 > 0:39:16the interest of the military and the politicians he was deeply depressed.
0:39:16 > 0:39:22Really shaken to his foundations of belief.
0:39:22 > 0:39:27And he has spoken about this and he said that at one point
0:39:27 > 0:39:31he considered resigning and entering the priesthood.
0:39:38 > 0:39:46Father announced at one meal time that he was thinking of joining
0:39:46 > 0:39:48the priesthood, so this,
0:39:48 > 0:39:51I don't know how many of us children where there,
0:39:51 > 0:39:55but let's say there was quite a number of us, and...
0:39:55 > 0:39:57this was pretty funny.
0:39:57 > 0:39:59I mean, let's be clear,
0:39:59 > 0:40:03the atmosphere in the family home was not reverential to anybody.
0:40:03 > 0:40:07Everybody just had to fight their corner, including my father.
0:40:07 > 0:40:10And so there were gales of laughter at this.
0:40:10 > 0:40:11We thought this was really funny.
0:40:11 > 0:40:15And I can't remember the detail, but I'm sure one of us attempted
0:40:15 > 0:40:19the imitation of a sermon given by Bernard Lovell
0:40:19 > 0:40:21explaining how God might well not exist.
0:40:25 > 0:40:28The priesthood clearly wasn't for Lovell,
0:40:28 > 0:40:32but his Methodist upbringing never left him and when the BBC invited him
0:40:32 > 0:40:37to deliver the Reith Lectures, it was to his spirituality that he turned.
0:40:39 > 0:40:42I am certainly not competent to discuss this problem of knowledge
0:40:42 > 0:40:45outside that required by my scientific tools
0:40:45 > 0:40:47and my outlook is essentially a simple one.
0:40:47 > 0:40:53Simple in the sense that I am no more surprised or distressed at
0:40:53 > 0:40:58the limitation of science when faced with this great problem of creation
0:40:58 > 0:41:01than I am at the limitation of the spectroscope in describing
0:41:01 > 0:41:03the radiance of a sunset.
0:41:03 > 0:41:07Or at the theory of counterpoint in describing the beauty of a fugue.
0:41:11 > 0:41:13He really had a real sense of beauty
0:41:13 > 0:41:16and when he talked about the universe, you know,
0:41:16 > 0:41:19people think that scientists just see everything in numbers, but
0:41:19 > 0:41:23scientists see everything in numbers and the numbers are beautiful.
0:41:25 > 0:41:30The Reith Lectures really gave him a sense of the legitimacy of
0:41:30 > 0:41:32the work here and what he was doing
0:41:32 > 0:41:35and how important it was and how valued it was in society.
0:41:35 > 0:41:39And certainly I think positioned him as a thinker as well as a scientist.
0:41:39 > 0:41:43I think it was an emergence of a new kind of public figure.
0:41:46 > 0:41:48While Lovell was now a public intellectual,
0:41:48 > 0:41:53the Jodrell Bank story had also found its way into popular culture
0:41:53 > 0:41:58via a BBC drama starring a new acting talent Julie Christie.
0:42:03 > 0:42:06A for Andromeda was a BBC series
0:42:06 > 0:42:09that was aired in 1961
0:42:09 > 0:42:13which just happens to be a story that is eerily similar
0:42:13 > 0:42:15to the Jodrell Bank story.
0:42:15 > 0:42:18It was set a large radio telescope in Yorkshire
0:42:18 > 0:42:21managed by a charming and affable professor.
0:42:21 > 0:42:23Sound familiar?
0:42:23 > 0:42:26- And what's that one, Harvey? - Number 102, professor.
0:42:26 > 0:42:29At this new telescope, just as it's opening,
0:42:29 > 0:42:33something dramatic happens, just like Jodrell Bank.
0:42:33 > 0:42:35It's not Sputnik this case,
0:42:35 > 0:42:38but it's the picking up of a mysterious signal.
0:42:38 > 0:42:44The signal is found to be coming from the Andromeda galaxy.
0:42:44 > 0:42:47So this is a direct lift from the Jodrell Bank story.
0:42:47 > 0:42:50Perhaps if it wasn't for that fluke we should never have heard it.
0:42:50 > 0:42:52PHONE RINGS
0:42:52 > 0:42:57It was written by Fred Hoyle, who was, alongside Lovell,
0:42:57 > 0:43:01the most visible, famous astronomer in the country.
0:43:03 > 0:43:05Throughout the 1960s,
0:43:05 > 0:43:08Lovell and his telescope continued to generate stories,
0:43:08 > 0:43:10somehow always finding their way
0:43:10 > 0:43:13to the centre of dramatic space age moments.
0:43:23 > 0:43:27Those weird sounds came from a spacecraft called Luna 9,
0:43:27 > 0:43:31again recorded here at Jodrell Bank here in 1966.
0:43:38 > 0:43:41Lunar 9 was an unmanned spacecraft.
0:43:41 > 0:43:43It landed on the surface of the moon.
0:43:43 > 0:43:46It took a photograph of the surface of the moon, developed it,
0:43:46 > 0:43:49scanned it and transmitted that photograph back to earth
0:43:49 > 0:43:51in the form of a radio signal.
0:43:51 > 0:43:54Lovell used the telescope to hack into the signal
0:43:54 > 0:43:56and, deploying an early kind of fax machine,
0:43:56 > 0:44:01printed off the first pictures from the surface of the moon.
0:44:06 > 0:44:09These were soon all over the news.
0:44:09 > 0:44:12Nothing like this had ever been seen before.
0:44:14 > 0:44:15After Lunar 9,
0:44:15 > 0:44:18Bernard Lovell was soon thrust back into the spotlight
0:44:18 > 0:44:22when James Burke, the BBC's main reporter on the space race,
0:44:22 > 0:44:25asked him to contribute to his coverage of the audacious quest
0:44:25 > 0:44:28to put men on the moon.
0:44:28 > 0:44:31We asked Lovell on the show because he was a fantastic performer.
0:44:31 > 0:44:34The audiences absolutely loved him.
0:44:34 > 0:44:37Charming, obeying, affable, articulate,
0:44:37 > 0:44:38spoke with great clarity
0:44:38 > 0:44:40about what he was talking about.
0:44:40 > 0:44:44He was also of course the President of the Royal Astronomical Society,
0:44:44 > 0:44:48so a big wheel, and he gave the programme kudos,
0:44:48 > 0:44:50it gave him authority.
0:44:50 > 0:44:53If somebody like that would come on our show
0:44:53 > 0:44:56it would make it look better than it was, and it did, and he did.
0:44:59 > 0:45:04Apollo 8 launched in 1968 was the first manned spacecraft
0:45:04 > 0:45:06to leave earth's orbit
0:45:06 > 0:45:11and fly around the moon recording the now iconic earthrise footage.
0:45:11 > 0:45:13It's hard to believe now because we're so blase about it,
0:45:13 > 0:45:16but to look up in the sky and think that there were people on
0:45:16 > 0:45:18the other side of the moon was just unbelievable.
0:45:18 > 0:45:20I mean, people went out in the street to stare up
0:45:20 > 0:45:22and you couldn't believe it was happening.
0:45:22 > 0:45:25But Lovell saw getting to the moon as a circus event
0:45:25 > 0:45:27and had mixed feelings about it.
0:45:27 > 0:45:31He was one of the first to question the value of the American missions.
0:45:31 > 0:45:34When Bernard was on the studio, inevitably
0:45:34 > 0:45:37the subject of the scientific purpose of the missions came up.
0:45:37 > 0:45:40And he was understandably ambivalent about it,
0:45:40 > 0:45:43as indeed many scientists were at the time.
0:45:43 > 0:45:45And so what then does this particular exercise
0:45:45 > 0:45:47add to our knowledge
0:45:47 > 0:45:49in terms of observing the moon surface, Sir Bernard?
0:45:49 > 0:45:54I don't honestly think that you must search too much for any new vivid
0:45:54 > 0:46:00scientific facts which are going to arise from these photographs.
0:46:00 > 0:46:02It's not really the point at all.
0:46:02 > 0:46:04We must treat it as a human adventure
0:46:04 > 0:46:07and superb engineering achievement.
0:46:07 > 0:46:10And I think later in life he said he became even more ambivalent
0:46:10 > 0:46:14about the question of whether or not you should send men anywhere.
0:46:14 > 0:46:18He did on Apollo 8 and later say that these were great technological
0:46:18 > 0:46:21triumphs, which of course they were if you think about it.
0:46:21 > 0:46:25Computing for example, the amount of computer power they had you know,
0:46:25 > 0:46:29I've got more on my cellphone today, but they got to the moon and back.
0:46:35 > 0:46:40If you like, the space race helped us to get the telescope working
0:46:40 > 0:46:45and financed a lot of good scientific work,
0:46:45 > 0:46:49but in itself the space race, the race to launch rockets
0:46:49 > 0:46:52and get them going and put people in rockets,
0:46:52 > 0:46:58that was not really our business at all.
0:46:58 > 0:47:01As the space programmes went on tracking equipment was developed
0:47:01 > 0:47:06all over the world and the reliance of Lovell's telescope declined.
0:47:09 > 0:47:14So Jodrell Bank was able to dedicate itself entirely to science.
0:47:14 > 0:47:17The kind of discoveries that Bernard was making with his own telescope
0:47:17 > 0:47:20were immensely more important than Apollo, immensely more important.
0:47:20 > 0:47:23I mean, Apollo, let's face it, was, "We're better than you."
0:47:23 > 0:47:27It was a political statement, really. 99% of it was that.
0:47:30 > 0:47:33If the space race was mainly metal bashing
0:47:33 > 0:47:37and Buck Rodgers, then the really big scientific question of the age wasn't
0:47:37 > 0:47:41can man walk on the moon but how did the universe begin?
0:47:41 > 0:47:45Radio astronomy was at the very centre of this debate,
0:47:45 > 0:47:47and Lovell one of those leading it.
0:47:47 > 0:47:51Sir Bernard, it seems to me that the scientist's choice between
0:47:51 > 0:47:55the Big Bang theory and the theory of continuous creation
0:47:55 > 0:47:57is really entirely an arbitrary one
0:47:57 > 0:48:00until somebody does some experiments or makes some
0:48:00 > 0:48:03observations to prove it one way or the other.
0:48:03 > 0:48:05Now, is this telescope going to help?
0:48:05 > 0:48:10Certainly. We think that it is penetrating so far back in time
0:48:10 > 0:48:14and out in space that it is giving us information about these
0:48:14 > 0:48:18regions which probably hold the key to this great problem.
0:48:22 > 0:48:24It was the radio astronomers who were the only ones
0:48:24 > 0:48:27capable of looking far enough back into time
0:48:27 > 0:48:31and space to picture the very beginning of the universe.
0:48:31 > 0:48:35They dealt the final death blow to the steady-state hypothesis
0:48:35 > 0:48:39by discovering the radiation left over from the big bang.
0:48:39 > 0:48:42But rather than settling debates, this probing into the outer
0:48:42 > 0:48:47reaches of the universe, would yield even more fantastic discoveries.
0:48:47 > 0:48:51And Jodrell Bank would have a hand in the next big breakthrough.
0:48:57 > 0:49:01One gifted student was inspired by a formative summer at Jodrell,
0:49:01 > 0:49:05being introduced to the cutting edge of experimental radio astronomy.
0:49:05 > 0:49:09Jocelyn Bell Burnell went on to do pioneering research
0:49:09 > 0:49:11at Cambridge University,
0:49:11 > 0:49:15from where she would make one of the most important astronomical
0:49:15 > 0:49:18discoveries of the 20th century.
0:49:18 > 0:49:21I began to notice there was something slightly
0:49:21 > 0:49:24curious on the records, they came out as paper charts,
0:49:24 > 0:49:28and, of course, on these charts you could see radio sources.
0:49:28 > 0:49:32But there was also something that wouldn't quite fit either bill.
0:49:32 > 0:49:34It wasn't exactly a twinkling radio source,
0:49:34 > 0:49:37and it wasn't exactly interference either.
0:49:37 > 0:49:42It finally turned out to be this signal that goes blip, blip, blip.
0:49:47 > 0:49:51Typically, when you look at radio waves coming from outer space,
0:49:51 > 0:49:54if you were to play those signals through a speaker, you would
0:49:54 > 0:49:56hear a hiss, a white noise.
0:49:56 > 0:49:58There would be no pattern detectable in there.
0:49:58 > 0:50:02Now, we have this regular pulsing pattern.
0:50:02 > 0:50:06In a sense, that would be exactly the sort of thing you might
0:50:06 > 0:50:09expect if someone was sending a deliberate signal.
0:50:09 > 0:50:13The natural assumption is it is artificial, it is Earth man made.
0:50:15 > 0:50:17Only, it wasn't Earth man made
0:50:17 > 0:50:22because it moved round the sky with the stars. So, is it ET?
0:50:22 > 0:50:24Is it little green men out there?
0:50:24 > 0:50:27But when Jocelyn found similar signals across the sky,
0:50:27 > 0:50:32it was soon realised that they were in fact exotic astronomical objects.
0:50:32 > 0:50:36About the same time I found the second, the third and the fourth.
0:50:36 > 0:50:37Then it gets really incredible
0:50:37 > 0:50:40that these things are little green men.
0:50:40 > 0:50:43It has to be something much more natural.
0:50:43 > 0:50:44It was soon realised, that these
0:50:44 > 0:50:47things were not extraterrestrials, but actually,
0:50:47 > 0:50:50perhaps something just as exciting for a physicist,
0:50:50 > 0:50:52they were things that we now call pulsars.
0:50:52 > 0:50:56They are actually the remnants of exploded stars.
0:50:56 > 0:51:02So when stars more than about eight times the mass of the sun,
0:51:02 > 0:51:05reached the end of their lives, they run out of nuclear fuel,
0:51:05 > 0:51:08and they collapse in on themselves.
0:51:08 > 0:51:11We see them because they beam out radiation from their magnetic
0:51:11 > 0:51:16poles and as the star spins, it behaves exactly like a lighthouse.
0:51:16 > 0:51:20This beam sweeps around and you see a flash, flash, flash.
0:51:27 > 0:51:30These distant beacons from the very depths of the universe,
0:51:30 > 0:51:33turned out to be ideal for Lovell's telescope to study
0:51:33 > 0:51:36because it could point to any part of the sky.
0:51:36 > 0:51:41Astronomers could test physics to its extremes using these objects
0:51:41 > 0:51:45and Jodrell Bank has been studying them for over 40 years.
0:51:45 > 0:51:46I think it is a lovely story
0:51:46 > 0:51:50that Jocelyn did, in fact, come to Jodrell Bank first,
0:51:50 > 0:51:54then went to Cambridge and made this magnificent discovery.
0:51:54 > 0:52:00Now, back in Jodrell, Jodrell is, in fact, one of the world centres,
0:52:00 > 0:52:06I should daresay the world centre, for pulsar research.
0:52:10 > 0:52:12So pulsars weren't a message from ET,
0:52:12 > 0:52:17but the idea of alien life was somehow in the ether.
0:52:17 > 0:52:19Both Bernard Lovell and Fred Hoyle,
0:52:19 > 0:52:23were prepared to entertain the notion with a good deal of enthusiasm.
0:52:23 > 0:52:26Now, it seems unlikely that the Earth is unique,
0:52:26 > 0:52:28and our own planetary system is unique.
0:52:28 > 0:52:33In fact, the modern ideas about the formation of planetary systems,
0:52:33 > 0:52:36makes it seem quite certain that planetary systems,
0:52:36 > 0:52:39of which the one around the sun is an example, must be
0:52:39 > 0:52:42of extremely frequent occurrence in the universe.
0:52:42 > 0:52:46Nature doesn't do things in ones and twos, she's not mean.
0:52:46 > 0:52:49There are millions of planets, millions of stars
0:52:49 > 0:52:50and millions of galaxies,
0:52:50 > 0:52:52and very likely up there,
0:52:52 > 0:52:55millions of other different kinds of intelligent creatures.
0:53:00 > 0:53:02What was once the sole concern of B-movies,
0:53:02 > 0:53:06was now being seen as a legitimate scientific query,
0:53:06 > 0:53:09backed up by the nation's leading astrophysicists.
0:53:14 > 0:53:17Stanley's interest really was -
0:53:17 > 0:53:19is there life elsewhere in the universe?
0:53:19 > 0:53:23So the only possibility we could find out whether
0:53:23 > 0:53:26there was extraterrestrial life was,
0:53:26 > 0:53:29of course, through radio astronomy.
0:53:29 > 0:53:33Could we pick up signals from other civilisations?
0:53:33 > 0:53:36Radio astronomy, of course, was the way to do it.
0:53:36 > 0:53:40At the end of the 1960s, Stanley Kubrick would make a visionary film
0:53:40 > 0:53:43about the question of life in the universe.
0:53:43 > 0:53:47He wanted it to be a serious work that engaged fully with hard science.
0:53:47 > 0:53:48But in order to do so,
0:53:48 > 0:53:51he would have to talk to a number of leading figures.
0:53:51 > 0:53:53First on the list, was Sir Bernard Lovell,
0:53:53 > 0:53:55Britain's leading astrophysicist.
0:53:57 > 0:54:02He chose Sir Bernard Lovell because the nearest thing
0:54:02 > 0:54:06we have had ever had in this country to a celebrity star astronomer.
0:54:06 > 0:54:10He was very visible at the time, and in a sense he was quite
0:54:10 > 0:54:14a natural person for Kubrick to come and speak to about 2001.
0:54:14 > 0:54:21I also think Lovell was very aware that it is by connecting people
0:54:21 > 0:54:22to stories and narrative
0:54:22 > 0:54:26and imagination that they then become connected to the science.
0:54:32 > 0:54:38I think there is a great similarity between Stanley's work
0:54:38 > 0:54:41and Sir Bernard Lovell.
0:54:41 > 0:54:45I think it can be summed up in one word - determination.
0:54:50 > 0:54:54Lovell made an impossible dream into a reality,
0:54:54 > 0:54:57turning a muddy field into an installation capable of giving
0:54:57 > 0:55:00Britain a key role in the space age.
0:55:00 > 0:55:03I think he did a tremendous amount in simply getting that
0:55:03 > 0:55:07telescope onto the public consciousness, which he did,
0:55:07 > 0:55:11partly because of his hard work and partly because of his charm.
0:55:11 > 0:55:15Every time he went on television, he was a winner. He had audiences.
0:55:21 > 0:55:22From a speculative beginning,
0:55:22 > 0:55:26the Lovell telescope is now an icon of British science.
0:55:27 > 0:55:31This telescope is still doing cutting edge scientific research.
0:55:31 > 0:55:34Actually, Jodrell Bank is now the home of the next great
0:55:34 > 0:55:38radio telescope, the Square Kilometre Array, which will see
0:55:38 > 0:55:41the future of radio astronomy for at least the next 50 years.
0:55:47 > 0:55:53The theme here isn't conflict, isn't defence, isn't spies,
0:55:53 > 0:55:59isn't what turns out to be ephemeral stuff,
0:55:59 > 0:56:02it's science.
0:56:02 > 0:56:05It is people seeking knowledge.
0:56:12 > 0:56:16The telescope is obviously an impressive scientific instrument,
0:56:16 > 0:56:19but what Lovell built far exceeds its initial purpose,
0:56:19 > 0:56:24and has inspired more than a small group of astrophysicists.
0:56:24 > 0:56:28From science-fiction creators, to small children who wanted to
0:56:28 > 0:56:30build it out of Meccano,
0:56:30 > 0:56:33the telescope is more than the sum of its parts.
0:56:33 > 0:56:36You walk on to that site and look at it and you just think, wow,
0:56:36 > 0:56:38it is overwhelming.
0:56:38 > 0:56:44It's a beautifully sculptured form, it certainly knocked me for six.
0:56:44 > 0:56:47I was lost for words.
0:56:47 > 0:56:51I think people have a really strong response to it because it is so big.
0:56:51 > 0:56:53I think it is a visceral human thing.
0:56:53 > 0:56:55I'm from the north-east of England
0:56:55 > 0:56:59and the Angel of the North has had a similar impact on people.
0:56:59 > 0:57:02There is a sense of ownership and place, really.
0:57:02 > 0:57:05People regard it as something that signals home
0:57:05 > 0:57:08or signals their own sense of belonging and heritage.
0:57:08 > 0:57:12I think that's connected to the fact that they also know it is
0:57:12 > 0:57:15picking up signals from way out in space, which is
0:57:15 > 0:57:18a really fascinating thing for everybody.
0:57:22 > 0:57:25Lovell, the son of Methodists,
0:57:25 > 0:57:27who listened to the heavens the better to understand
0:57:27 > 0:57:31the signs of the universe, is a very modern kind of hero,
0:57:31 > 0:57:34who leaves behind a very special legacy.
0:57:38 > 0:57:42Sir Bernard Lovell died in August 2012,
0:57:42 > 0:57:45but the telescope which bears his name, has fused itself
0:57:45 > 0:57:49into both the Cheshire landscape and the popular imagination.
0:57:50 > 0:57:53People say, "And where are you from?"
0:57:53 > 0:57:59We said, "You wouldn't know, it's way in the heart of Cheshire,
0:57:59 > 0:58:02"right near the telescope."
0:58:02 > 0:58:06You'd only to mention Jodrell Bank telescope.
0:58:06 > 0:58:09"Oh yes, I've been there."
0:58:09 > 0:58:14We are being put on the map because of the telescope.
0:58:17 > 0:58:22It's fitted in, it's fitted in beautifully.
0:58:22 > 0:58:24When you're looking at it
0:58:24 > 0:58:27going along the road from Twemlow towards Chelford,
0:58:27 > 0:58:30it's just a magnificent sight, really.
0:58:30 > 0:58:32Especially in the sunset,
0:58:32 > 0:58:38when the sun is going down and the light is shining on it.
0:58:38 > 0:58:40It is a wonderful sight.