Posts filed under 'History'
blog:A Brief History of Him
Stephen William Hawking was born on 8 January 1942 (300 years after the death of Galileo) in
Oxford, England. His parents’ house was in north London, but during the second world war
Oxford was considered a safer place to have babies. When he was eight, his family moved to
St Albans, a town about 20 miles north of London. At eleven Stephen went to St Albans
School, and then on to University College, Oxford, his father’s old college. Stephen wanted
to do Mathematics, although his father would have preferred medicine. Mathematics was not
available at University College, so he did Physics instead. After three years and not very
much work he was awarded a first class honours degree in Natural Science.Stephen then went
on to Cambridge to do research in Cosmology, there being no-one working in that area in
Oxford at the time. His supervisor was Denis Sciama, although he had hoped to get Fred Hoyle
who was working in Cambridge. After gaining his Ph.D. he became first a Research Fellow, and
later on a Professorial Fellow at Gonville and Caius College. After leaving the Institute of
Astronomy in 1973 Stephen came to the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical
Physics, and since 1979 has held the post of Lucasian Professor of Mathematics. The chair
was founded in 1663 with money left in the will of the Reverend Henry Lucas, who had been
the Member of Parliament for the University. It was first held by Isaac Barrow, and then in
1669 by Isaac Newton.
