New Zealand had it's own version of John Dobson in the Graham Loftus. Graham worked on many, many large
telescopes and he and John both knew the importance of letting the public look through these large tools. To them, they were
tools, tools to understanding your neighborhood (the Univserse). Both men had alternative cosmological views which often put
them in difficult positions with amateur clubs and professional cosmologists.
John visited with Graham on a couple of trips to New Zealand and they kept up an active correspondance for many years.
Graham died in 2015, not so long after JD.
From Mike
Belcher's eulogy:
John always stayed with Graham when he came to Auckland and the became great
friends and mutual admireres. John dobson once said, "It's not me these people are interested in, it's what I show them."
When under the stars with a group of people clustered around on of his big telescopes, this was clearly Graham's philosophy
too. While John was clearly more famous, he often mentioned his New Zealand friend Graham along with this quote, "What
we need is a big telescope in every village and hamlet, and some bloke there with that fire in his eye who can show something
of the glory the world sails in."
Read more about Graham from Mike Belcher
