Fred Hoyle was born in England in 1915. He attended Emmanuel and St. John's Colleges, Cambridge where he studied mathematics and theoretical physics and then became a Fellow at St. John's for over thirty years. He became a lecturer of mathematics at Cambridge where starting in the late 1940s, he gained wide acclaim for formulating the theory of stellar nucleosynthesis. In 1949, during an appearance on a BBC radio program, Hoyle coined the term "Big Bang", a theory he would later refute.
In 1958, Hoyle was appointed Plumian Professor of Astronomy and Experimental Philosophy at Cambridge. From 1967 to 1972, he was the founding director of the Institute of Theoretical Astronomy. He then became an Honorary Professor of Physics and Astronomy at Manchester University, and visiting Professor of Astrophysics at the California Institute of Technology.
Hoyle was a Fellow of the Royal Society of London and was knighted in 1972 for his outstanding contribution to astronomical thought.
Hoyle delivered a series of three Beatty lectures in March 1975 titled "The Emergence of Intelligence in the Universe", "Cosmological Theories and Controversies" and "The History of Matter".
Listen to Fred Hoyle's first Beatty Lecture:
Part 1 Part 3 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6
Article in the March 12, 1975 edition of Â鶹AV's The Reporter. Image: Â鶹AV Archives.
Audio: Â鶹AV Archives
Top image: St John's College Archives, Cambridge
