Post ApbdGcqoREUJe3uX5M by drgeraint@glasgow.social
(DIR) More posts by drgeraint@glasgow.social
(DIR) Post #ApbdGbmWPhSgKStal6 by pozorvlak@mathstodon.xyz
2024-12-31T13:02:50Z
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Some sad personal news: my father died last night, of pneumonia acquired while being treated for metastatic lung cancer. He was a month shy of his eightieth birthday, and went peacefully in his sleep - though sadly not at home, as he'd have wanted. He'd had a storied life, first as an Air Force pilot, then as an Air Force general, then as a GIS expert, then as a physics teacher for the Open University. He showed me the beauty of mathematics, and I'm sure he did the same for many others. He was arrested for spying on a school trip to Czechoslovakia in the Fifties (he was just a kid who liked taking pictures of planes, but it turns out they don't like that sort of thing in Communist countries); forty years later he went back to help the Czech Army integrate itself into the NATO command structure, and they showed him all their WW3 plans for a laugh. For a while he was the author of the longest Ada program in the world. He visited over sixty countries from Greenland to New Zealand, flew round the world several times, and was on a cruise in Alaska when his illness made itself known just under three months ago. He was presented with a CBE by the Queen at Buckingham Palace, I dedicated my PhD thesis to him, and he was Rickrolled at #BigMathsJam for going more than a minute over his five-minute slot. He is survived by his son (me), and my mother, his wife of 52 years. Gonna miss you, Dad.
(DIR) Post #ApbdGcqoREUJe3uX5M by drgeraint@glasgow.social
2024-12-31T13:24:07Z
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@pozorvlak Sorry to hear that. My condolences. Sounds like he led a very full life.
(DIR) Post #ApbdkDlyF5wKYQl4ng by pozorvlak@mathstodon.xyz
2024-12-31T13:29:30Z
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@drgeraint thank you! And yes, he did 😁