The recent death of theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking brought back a happy memory for CAA member Joe Golias. Among the accounts of the famous scientist’s life, a photograph and story resurfaced showing Hawking next to a specially-equipped telescope; a system Hawking could operate himself, to view and image celestial objects. The local tie-in? Golias owns and operates Astrozap, a respected manufacturer of telescope accessories, dew shields particularly.

Golias writes, “I was told by the Celestron folks that the Hawking team purchased a special system to enable Mr. Hawking to do Astrophotography from his home. While the Celestron folks do carry their own line of dew shields, they wanted Mr. Hawking to have the best on the market. Celestron purchased the Astrozap dew shield and Astrozap dew controller during a UK imaging conference.” Shields and heaters (controllers) help prevent formation of fog and dew on telescope lenses.

There, in a photo posted to Hawking’s Facebook, is the Celestron telescope wearing its handsome dew shield emblazoned with the Astrozap name! What a wonderful milestone and memory for our own Joe Golias! {Here’s the Full-Size Image}

Here is a link to a detailed story of the telescope as told by the good folks at Celestron: Building a Telescope for Stephen Hawking