h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Scientists and Inventors

Dr William Gilberd (1544-1603) - scientist (1544-1603)
William Gilberd (or Gilbert) was the pioneer of the study of magnetism in England. He lived in Trinity Street, Colchester.

Lionel Lukin, Inventor of the Lifeboat and Rain Gauge - (1742-1834)
Lionel Lukin, born in Little Dunmow, invented the lifeboat and the rain gauge.

Guglielmo Marconi, father of the wireless (1874-1937)
Marconi put into practice the principles of radio. His first factory was in Chelmsford and the first public broadcast was made from the county town.

John Ray - (1627-1705)
Braintree-educated John Ray is known as the Father of Natural History for his ground-breaking Historia Plantarum.

Scientists and Inventors

Dr William Gilberd (1544-1603) - scientist (1544-1603)
William Gilberd (or Gilbert) was the pioneer of the study of magnetism in England. He lived in Trinity Street, Colchester.

Lionel Lukin, Inventor of the Lifeboat and Rain Gauge - (1742-1834)
Lionel Lukin, born in Little Dunmow, invented the lifeboat and the rain gauge.

Guglielmo Marconi, father of the wireless (1874-1937)
Marconi put into practice the principles of radio. His first factory was in Chelmsford and the first public broadcast was made from the county town.

John Ray - (1627-1705)
Braintree-educated John Ray is known as the Father of Natural History for his ground-breaking Historia Plantarum.

Social and Historical

Robert Adam - architect (1728-1792)
Adam's work lives on in the model port of Mistley, in the north of the county.

Lieutenant Augustus Agar - War hero (World War One)
Awarded the Victoria Cross for his "conspicious gallantry, coolness and skill..."

John Ball (14th Century) - rebel leader (14th century)
John Ball of Colchester was a leading participant in the Peasants' Revolt of 1381. His riddle "While Adam delved and Eve span, who then was the Gentleman?" has been quoted by the oppressed ever since.

Boudica - (Boadicea) - warrior queen (first century)
Boudica was queen of the Iceni, the tribe which so nearly drummed the Romans out of Britain - laying waste to Colchester and London in the process.

Sir Edwin Dunning - aviation pioneer (20th century)
On August 2 1917, Squadron Commander Dunning, whose grave is at Bradfield, near Harwich, landed an aircraft onto the deck of a cruiser for the first time.

Elizabeth Fry - prison reformer (19th century)
Prison reformer Elizabeth Fry, who lived in Essex, lived in Plashet, now East Ham, after marrying merchant Joseph Fry in 1800.

Thomas Hooker - a father of American democracy (1586-1647) Hooker was a Puritan lecturer in and around Chelmsford until he fled to the New World. His sermon on God's fundamental right over human societies was enshrined in the US Constitution.

Matthew Hopkins - Witchfinder General (died 1647)
Hopkins tortured women and put them to death on the flimsiest of pretexts - but with official blessing at a time when fear of the supernatural was at its height.

David Melling - War hero (20th century)
David Melling, who lived in Coggeshall, was blinded aged 18 when he was shot in the head during the Gallipoli campaign of 1915.


James Parnell - Quaker martyr (1636-1656)
Parnell was just 19 when he died in Colchester Castle - a victim of religious intolerance. He was a key figure in the development of the Quaker religion.

William Penn - Quaker and founder of Pennsylvania (1644-1718)
Penn went to school in Chigwell - and developed radical ideas on freedom and equality, which he brought to bear in his dealings with native Americans. He is seen now as a man of peace, an icon of today's USA.

Samuel Pepys - Harwich MP and diarist (1633-1703)
Samuel Pepys lived through exciting times - as a boy he experienced civil war and revolution, and later the plague and the Great Fire of London of 1666.

Dick Turpin - highwayman (1706-1739)
Find out the truth (or as near as you'll ever get to it) about this vicious robber and murderer born near Saffron Walden.

Sport

Nasser Hussain
The former Essex and England skipper who helped England to their first win over the West Indies in the Caribbean for 36 years

Piers Courage - Grand Prix driver (1942-1970)
Talented rising star, killed at the 1970 Dutch Grand Prix.

Sally Gunnell - runner (1966- )
Sally Gunnell, born and brought up in Chigwell, was the golden girl of British athletics.

Andrew Halsey - Yachtsman and adventurer (1958- )
Ocean rower and former bricklayer from Clacton, Halsey was the first disabled person to row the Atlantic in 1997.

Johnny Herbert - Grand Prix driver (1964 - )
Formula One ace from Brentwood who won the 1995 British Grand Prix.

Sir Geoff Hurst - football legend (1941-
Sir Geoff Hurst is best known for his hat-trick which helped England win the World Cup against Germany at Wembley.

Rod Harrington - world's top darts player (1957-)
Find out which Essex pubs the world's number one used to play for.

Jim Peters - heartbreak marathon man (1918 - )
Peters, who lives near Southend, won the sympathy of the world as he collapsed 12 times in the last few yards of the marathon in 1954 Empire Games, only to be disqualified.

Vivian Woodward - soccer superstar of his day (1879 - 1954)
Woodward played for Clacton Town and Harwich... and went on to score Spurs' first league goal and eight goals in England's 1908 15-0 drubbing of France, a record which still stands.

Television, Film and Theatre

Arthur Askey - comedian (1900-1982)
Arthur Askey - remembered for his lightning humour, catchphrases and daft songs, made his professional debut at Headgate Theatre, St John's Street, Colchester.

Darren Day - actor and TV presenter (1968 - )
Television and West End star Darren Day was born and educated in Colchester.

Noel Edmonds - television presenter (1948 - )
Noel Edmonds' BBC programme House Party pulls in millions of viewers every Saturday night.

Lee Evans, comedian and actor
Lee Evans just loves Essex - and he won't be moving to Hollywood.

Christopher Guest, actor
Guest, who played gormless heavy metal guitarist Nigel Tufnell in the spoof rocumentary Spinal Tap, is also the Fifth Baron Haden-Guest of Saling, near Braintree.

Joan Hickson OBE - Actress (1906-1998)
Wivenhoe actress Joan Hickson was known to millions of television viewers as Agatha Christie's detective Miss Marple.

Alfred Hitchcock - Movie-maker (1899-1980)
The great movie director may not have hailed from the county originally, but he has claimed it was Essex which inspired him to his cinematic heights.

John O'Neill - whistling legend (1926 - 1999)
The man responsible for the famous whistle in The Good, The Bad and the Ugly.

Jamie Oliver - (1975-)
TV cook, Jamie Oliver grew up in Clavering, where his parents ran a local pub/restaurant.

Denise Van Outen (1974-)
Blonde bombshell Denise Van Outen, who is Basildon-born, shot to fame in a two-and-a-half year stint presenting Channel 4's The Big Breakfast.
She left in December 1998, but the chemistry between Denise her and co-presenter Johnny Vaughan was credited with turning the show's flagging viewing figures around.

Ross Kemp
The man who brought Grant Mitchell to life in EastEnders now enjoying a career in drama on ITV.

Helen Mirren
The star of Prime Suspect who started her career on the stage and recently started directing.

Donna Barnard
The presenter grew up in Long Lynderswood and worked at Tesco in Pitsea and in the Sainsbury's Savacentre restaurant in Basildon before rising to fame.

Writers and poets

Margery Allingham - writer, creator of Campion the detective (1904-1966)
Writer Margery Allingham is remembered for her creation, the detective Albert Campion.

Daniel Defoe - Robinson Crusoe author (1660-1731)
Defoe lived in Colchester - but what did he have to say about the Canvey man who was on his 25th wife, and what reputation did he give to the people of Harwich?

Andrew Motion - Poet Laureate (1953-)
Stisted-raised Andrew Motion was appointed the new Poet Laureate in May 1999.
Douglas Adams - Creator of The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy (1952-2001)
Douglas Adams was educated in the county at Brentwood schools before going onto write his cult novel and its sequels.

Dorothy Leigh Sayers - author of the Lord Peter Wimsey books (1893-1957)
Dorothy L. Sayers, who created the detective Lord Peter Wimsey, lived at 22 Newland Street, Witham, from 1929 and wrote several Wimsey novels while she was in the town.

Atherton Fleming
Dorothy Leigh Sayers' husband.

Dodie Smith - author of 101 Dalmatians (1896-1990)
Dodie Smith is the not-so-famous writer of the book 101 Dalmatians. She lived in a cottage in the chocolate-box village

Essex ex-Southend FC goalkeeper Terry Alderton has been into BBC Towers in Chelmsford to speak to Gabrielle Grindrod about his career as a stand-up comic. Who was born in born in Rochford hospital and I lived in Leigh for two years, and then I've spent most of my time living in South Woodham Ferres and I'm always down at Southend United

I could not get much on where John Fowles was born except that it was Essex

John Fowles 1926-
"Writing is the most difficult thing in the world and takes great courage."
Birthplace
Essex, England
Education - Edinburgh University and New College, Oxford, studying German and French, especially the existentialists.
Military service; taught English abroad (including in Greece, giving him material for The Magus).
The Magus, impressive and exasperating by turns, is his most ambitious novel ("I fell into almost every trap awaiting the tyro writer", Fowles admits). The French Lieutenant's Woman, combining Victorian pastiche and post modern interjections, is more accessible and perhaps more loved.

Sarah Miles
31 December 1941
Ingatestone, Essex, England, UK
Films: Poirot: The Hollow (2004) (TV) .
Hope and Glory (1987)
White Mischief (1987
The Big Sleep (1978) .
Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines, or How I Flew from London to Paris in 25 hours 11 minutes (1965)

Joan Sims 1930 - 2001
Carry On Films: 24
First: Carry On Nurse
Last: Carry On Emmannuelle

Some of her non Carry On Parts
As Time Goes By (1997) (TV)
The Canterville Ghost (1996) (TV)
Mrs. Umney Martin Chuzzlewit (1995) TV Series ....
(1986)TV Series Deceptions (1985) (TV)
Mrs. Thirkell A Murder Is Announced (1984) (TV) ..Murgatroyd
Born and Bred (1978)TV Series
Upstairs and Downstairs (1959) .
Belles of St. Trinians, The (1954) ....
Doctor in the House (1954) ..

Sally Gunnell OBE
Date of Birth: 29th July 1966
Birthplace: Chigwell
Held all four major championship gold medals
Olympic, World, Commonwealth and European as well as World record

Great stuff...
Makes us proud to be [directly or indirectly] "Essexians"...
Talk soon everyone [with hopefully some good news ]...
Loup

Thanks Loup

Sally Gunnell

Great Britain

DATE OF BIRTH
Friday, 29th July 1966

PLACE OF BIRTH
Chigwell, Essex, England

EVENT(S):
100m Hurdles, 400m Hurdles, 4x400m

CHAMPIONSHIP PERFORMANCES:
Olympics: 1992 Gold 400mH, bronze 4x400m. Worlds: 1991 silver 400mH, 1993 Gold 400mH, bronze 4x400m. European: 1990 bronze 4x400m, 1994 Gold 400mH. Commonwealth: 1986 Gold 100mH, 1990 silver 400mH, Gold 400mH, Gold 4x400m, 1994 Gold 400mH, Gold 4x400m.

Dr William Gilberd (1544-1603) - scientist (1544-1603)
William Gilberd (or Gilbert) was the pioneer of the study of magnetism in England. He lived in Trinity Street, Colchester.

Lionel Lukin, Inventor of the Lifeboat and Rain Gauge - (1742-1834)
Lionel Lukin, born in Little Dunmow, invented the lifeboat and the rain gauge.

Guglielmo Marconi, father of the wireless (1874-1937)
Marconi put into practice the principles of radio. His first factory was in Chelmsford and the first public broadcast was made from the county town.

John Ray - (1627-1705)
Braintree-educated John Ray is known as the Father of Natural History for his ground-breaking Historia Plantarum.

Busted - Band
One of the band members is James Bourne from Southend.

Vince Clarke (1961- ) - musician

Keith Flint (1971 - ) - musician (1971 - )
Manic Keith is frontman for the band Prodigy.

Liam Howlett (1971 - ) - musician (1971 - )
Liam is the musical force behind the band Prodigy.

Jay Kay, frontman of jazz-funk band Jamiroquai (1971-)
Jay Kay fronts jazz-funk outfit Jamiroquai - and was born in Colchester.

Dr Feelgood
The feelgood factor is as strong as ever for this south Essex band.

Tina Cousins - singer
Former model turned singer who has appeared on the Brit Awards and had top 20 hits.

Blur - Britpop band
Chart-topping band which has connections with Colchester.

Sade - solo artist
Information on the singer who grew up in Clacton.

Scott Robinson - Singer with pop band 5ive.

Alison Moyet - Singer and part of pop group Yazoo.

Depeche Mode - Basildon based group

Doreen Waddell - Vocalist with Soul II Soul

Lawrence Washington (great, great grandfather of George Washington), William Harvey (discovered circulation of blood), Christopher Jones (Master of the Mayflower), Guglielmo Marconi (father of wireless), Captain Oates (explorer) and Samuel Pepys, diarist.

- Carly Hillman She played Nikki De Marco in Eastenders
Jimmy Greaves used to live in Upminster as did the late Ian Drury.
Clive Alen who played for Spurs and England
Jimmy Greaves who lived in 'The Fairway'.
Fulton Mckay who played the chief warden in Porridge
Victor Madden TV actor who last appeared in a Miss Marple
Windsor Manor
Jimmy Jones (Comedian)
Katy Hill off of Blue Peter

Professional snooker player: Steve Davis, Brentwood 22/08/57

High Break:
147

Ranking:
1st ( 1983/84 to 1989/90)

Turned Professional:
1978
Steve Davis began playing snooker at the age of 12. He won the National Under-19 billiards championship in 1976. A sports promoter named Barry Hearn spotted him playing at a club in Romford. Hearn realised his potential and a contract was drawn up.

Achievements:
World Professional Snooker Champion 1981, 1983, 1984, 1987, 1988, 1989
UK Championship winner 1980, 1981, 1984, 1985, 1986, 1987
Benson & Hedges Masters champion 1982, 1988, 1997
Benson & Hedges Irish Masters champion 1983, 1984, 1987, 1988, 1990, 1991, 1993, 1994
Grand Prix champion 1985, 1988, 1989
Lada / Mercantile Credit Classic Champion 1983, 1984, 1987, 1988, 1992
International Open winner 1981, 1983, 1984, 1987, 1988, 1989
British Open champion 1986, 1993
European Open champion 1993
Asian Open champion 1992
Welsh Open champion 1993, 1994
Thailand Masters champion 1992
Canadian Masters champion 1986
World Doubles winner 1982, 1983, 1985, 1986 (with Tony Meo)
China International Champion 1998
Scottish Masters champion 1982, 1983, 1984
English Professional champion 1981, 1985
Yamaha International champion 1981, 1982, 1984
Tolly Cobbold Classic champion 1982, 1983, 1984
BBC Pot Black champion 1982, 1983
Hong Kong Masters winner 1984, 1987
Matchroom League winner 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990
Matchroom Professional Champion 1989
Australian Masters Champion 1986
World Matchplay Champion 1988
European Grand Prix champion 1989
World Series winner 1992
Belgian Challenge winner 1992
Red Bull Super League winner 1998

Ah, the Romford Robot.

Apparently he was a very generous tipper in Pizza Hut as well.

Blues Shark

Here is another Essex snooker player.

Ali Carter Snooker player

Allister Carter Date of Birt 25 Jul 1979
He lives in Tiptree,
Official Ranking 21st
Ranking Points this Season
Turned Professional 1996
Best Ranking Performance Semi-finals - Grand Prix 1999 Last Seasons Prize Money £62,700
Career Prize Money £261,575 (up to start of 2004-2005 season)
Highest Tournament Break 143 – Travis Perkins UK Championship 2003

Carter’s best efforts was in 2003/04 when he came at the first event – the LG Cup in Preston. He beat Mike Dunn, Graeme Dott and Barry Hawkins to reach the quarter-finals before losing 5-3 to the eventual winner Mark Williams.

He then went on to reach the last 16 of the Travis Perkins UK Championship in York. Carter’s performances during the 1999-2000 season earned him the award of WPBSA Newcomer of the Year.

In 1999 Grand Prix in Preston, he won six matches on his way through to the semi-finals. He had beaten Hendry and Hong Kong’s Marco Fu on the way to the semi-finals. He won the B&H Championship at Malvern the following month which had earned him a wild-card entry to the Masters at Wembley, where he beat Steve Davis 6-5 in the first round.

Carter was chosen as one of the World Snooker’s pioneering six Young Players of Distinction for the 2000-2001 season and he also finished top of the first YPD League. He qualified for the Crucible for the first time in 2003 but later on he lost 10-5 to Paul Hunter.