Pete Manly 1945-2007
Jim Strait
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From: Randall Whitlock
Subject: Pete Manly 1945-2007
Date: Sat, 28 Jul 2007
Friends,
I received word just before Friday's CASFS meeting that Pete Manly
passed away at 3:45 PM MST on July 27, 2007 at the VA Hospital in
Phoenix, Arizona.
Among his many careers, Pete was a US Air Force officer, astronomer,
scientific instrument builder, engineer for Ford Aerospace and Motorola,
journalist, and author. Pete was a long-time board member of the
Central Arizona Speculative Fiction Society. Pete held the distinction
of being the first person to have "Astronomer" officially listed as his
military occupational specialty.
Among his available writings are the popular astronomy works "Unusual
Telescopes" and "The 60-millimeter Schmidt-Cassegrain Telescope" and his
fantasy novel "Dragon Three-Two Niner." Pete was a frequent contributor
to the aviation magazine "Arizona Flyways."
Combining his love of astronomy and woodworking, Pete built several
faithful reproductions of Galileo's original telescope set. Some of
those are now on display in museums around the country.
Pete and his family were among the first to make me feel truly welcome
when I first moved to Arizona in the late 1980s. We met at WesterCon in
1988, when we both happened to be wearing classic Trek uniforms. We
immediately combined forces as a team in the trivia contest.
Pete was a fascinating character of bold, controversial opinions. I
enjoyed our many conversations and several shared projects. We pitched
a book on meteorites (my own academic specialty) to his publisher,
Cambridge University Press, in 1995. The editor passed on the book
proposal, but I'll always treasure the memory of the hours we put into
researching and writing the sample chapter. We also wrote one or two
humorous science satire pieces under pseudonyms.
As many of you are aware, Pete's health had been on the decline for the
past several years due to the neurological damage inflicted by exposure
to agent orange during his service in Vietnam.
Pete did not want a funeral in the conventional sense. He did, however,
leave instructions for a fannish wake. I will post details as soon as
they are worked out.
Randall Whitlock
Please forward this sad news to any who knew Pete and his works. Please
forgive if you receive multiple copies.