Name	Saint Bede the Venerable
Birth date	ca. 673
Death date	May 26, 735
Feast day	25 May (Western Churches) 27 May (Orthodox Church and General Roman Calendar, between 1899–1969)
Venerated in	Roman Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodox Church, Anglican Communion, Lutheran Church
Birth place	near Sunderland
Death place	Jarrow, Northumbria
Titles	Doctor of the Church, Monk, Historian
Canonized date	1899 recognised as Doctor of the Church
Canonized place	Rome
Canonized by	Pope Leo XIII
Patronage	English writers and historians; Jarrow
Major shrine	Durham Cathedral.
Issues	}}

Bede ( ; ; 672/673 – 26 May 735), also referred to as Saint Bede or the Venerable Bede (), was a monk at the Northumbrian monastery of Saint Peter at Monkwearmouth, today part of Sunderland, England, and of its companion monastery, Saint Paul's, in modern Jarrow (see Wearmouth-Jarrow), both in the Kingdom of Northumbria. Bede's monastery had access to a superb library which included works by Eusebius and Orosius among many others.

He is well known as an author and scholar, and his most famous work, ''Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum'' (''The Ecclesiastical History of the English People'') gained him the title "The Father of English History". In 1899, Bede was made a Doctor of the Church by Leo XIII, a position of theological significance; he is the only native of Great Britain to achieve this designation (Anselm of Canterbury, also a Doctor of the Church, was originally from Italy). Bede was moreover a skilled linguist and translator, and his work with the Latin and Greek writings of the early Church Fathers contributed significantly to English Christianity, making the writings much more accessible to his fellow Anglo-Saxons.

Life

Almost everything that is known of Bede's life is contained in the last chapter of his ''Historia Ecclesiastica'', a history of the church in England. It was completed in about 731, and Bede implies that he was then in his fifty-ninth year, which would give a likely birth date of about 672–673. A minor source of information is the letter by his disciple Cuthbert which relates Bede's death. Bede, in the ''Historia'', gives his birthplace as "on the lands of this monastery". He is referring to the twinned monasteries of Wearmouth and Jarrow, near modern-day Sunderland and Newcastle, respectively; both have been claimed as his birthplace, and there is also a tradition that he was born at Monkton, two miles from the monastery at Jarrow. Bede says nothing of his origins, but his connections with men of noble ancestry suggest that his own family was well-to-do. Bede's first abbot was Benedict Biscop, and the names "Biscop" and "Beda" both appear in a king list of the kings of Lindsey from around 800, further suggesting that Bede came from a noble family. The name "Bede" was not a common one at the time. The ''Liber Vitae'' of Durham Cathedral includes a list of priests; two are named Bede, and one of these is presumably Bede himself. Some manuscripts of the ''Life of Cuthbert'', one of Bede's own works, mention that Cuthbert's own priest was named Bede; it is possible that this priest is the other name listed in the ''Liber Vitae''. These occurrences, along with a ''Bieda'' who is mentioned in the ''Anglo-Saxon Chronicle'' under the year 501, are the only appearances of the name in early sources. The name probably derives from the Old English ''bēd'', or prayer; if Bede was given the name at his birth, then his family had probably always planned for him to enter the clergy.

At the age of seven, he was sent to the monastery of Wearmouth by his family to be educated by Benedict Biscop and later by Ceolfrith. Bede does not say whether it was already intended at that point that he would be a monk. It was fairly common in Ireland at this time for young boys, particularly those of noble birth, to be fostered out; the practice was also likely to have been common among the Germanic peoples in England. Wearmouth's sister monastery at Jarrow was founded by Ceolfrith in 682, and Bede probably transferred to Jarrow with Ceolfrith that year. The dedication stone for the church has survived to the present day; it is dated 23 April 685, and as Bede would have been required to assist with menial tasks in his day-to-day life it is possible that he helped in building the original church. In 686, plague broke out at Jarrow. The ''Life of Ceolfrith'', written in about 710, records that only two surviving monks were capable of singing the full offices; one was Ceolfrith and the other a young boy, who according to the anonymous writer had been taught by Ceolfrith and was "now a priest of the same monastery". After a week of singing the psalms without the usual antiphons, Ceolfrith "could not bear it any longer", and the two managed to restore the usual service, "with no little labour". The young boy was almost certainly Bede, who would have been about 14.

When Bede was about 17 years old, Adomnan, the abbot of Iona Abbey, visited Wearmouth and Jarrow. Bede would probably have met the abbot during this visit, and it may be that Adomnan sparked Bede's interest in the Easter dating controversy. In about 692, in Bede's nineteenth year, Bede was ordained a deacon by his diocesan bishop, John, who was bishop of Hexham. The canonical age for the ordination of a deacon was 25; Bede's early ordination may mean that his abilities were considered exceptional, but it is also possible that the minimum age requirement was often disregarded. There might have been minor orders ranking below a deacon; but there is no record of whether Bede held any of these offices.|group=notes}} In Bede's thirtieth year (about 702) Bede became a priest, with the ordination again performed by Bishop John.

In about 701 Bede wrote his first works, the ''De Arte Metrica'' and ''De Schematibus et Tropis''; both were intended for use in the classroom. He continued to write for the rest of his life, eventually completing over 60 books, most of which have survived. Not all of his output can be easily dated, and Bede may have worked on some texts over a period of many years. His last surviving work is a letter to Ecgbert of York, a former student, written in 734. A 6th-century Greek and Latin manuscript of ''Acts'' that is believed to have been used by Bede survives and is now in the Bodleian Library; it is known as the Codex Laudianus. Bede may also have worked on one of the Latin bibles that were copied at Jarrow, one of which is now held by the Laurentian Library in Florence. Bede was a teacher as well as a writer; he enjoyed music, and was said to be accomplished as a singer and as a reciter of poetry in the vernacular. It is possible that he suffered a speech impediment of some kind, but this depends on a phrase in the introduction to his verse life of Saint Cuthbert. Translations of this phrase differ, and it is quite uncertain whether Bede intended to say that he was cured of a speech problem, or merely that he was inspired by the saint's works.

In 708, some monks at Hexham accused Bede of having committed heresy in his work ''De Temporibus''. The standard theological view of world history at the time was known as the six ages of the world; in his book, Bede calculated the age of the world for himself, rather than accepting the authority of Isidore of Seville, and came to the conclusion that Christ had been born 3,952 years after the creation of the world, rather than the figure of over 5,000 years that was commonly accepted by theologians. The accusation occurred in front of the bishop of Hexham of the time, Wilfrid, who was present at a feast when some drunken monks made the accusation. Wilfrid did not respond to the accusation, but a monk present relayed the episode to Bede, who replied within a few days to the monk, writing a letter setting forth his defence and asking that the letter be read to Wilfrid also. Bede had another brush with Wilfrid, for the historian himself says that he met Wilfrid, sometime between 706 and 709, and discussed Æthelthryth, the abbess of Ely. Wilfrid had been present at the exhumation of her body in 695, and Bede questioned the bishop about the exact circumstances of the body and asked for more details of her life, as Wilfrid had been her advisor. In 733, Bede travelled to York, to visit Ecgbert, who was then bishop of York. The see of York was elevated to an archbishopric in 735, and it is likely that Bede and Ecgbert discussed the proposal for the elevation during his visit. Bede hoped to visit Ecgbert again in 734, but was too ill to make the journey. Bede also travelled to the monastery of Lindisfarne, and at some point visited the otherwise unknown monastery of a monk named , a visit that is mentioned in a letter to that monk. Because of his widespread correspondence with others throughout the British Isles, and due to the fact that many of the letters imply that Bede had met his correspondents, it is likely that Bede travelled to some other places, although nothing further about timing or locations can be guessed. It seems certain that he did not visit Rome, however, as he would have mentioned it in the autobiographical chapter of his ''Historia Ecclesiastica''. Nothhelm, a correspondent of Bede's who assisted him by finding documents for him in Rome, is known to have visited Bede, though the date cannot be determined beyond the fact that it was after Nothhelm's visit to Rome.

Bede died on Thursday, 26 May 735 (Ascension Day) and was buried at Jarrow. Cuthbert, a disciple of Bede's, wrote a letter to a Cuthwin (of whom nothing else is known), describing Bede's last days and his death. According to Cuthbert, Bede fell ill "with frequent attacks of breathlessness but almost without pain", before Easter. On the Tuesday before Acension Day (26 May) his breathing became worse, and his feet swelled. He continued to dictate to a scribe, however, and despite spending the night awake in prayer he dictated again the following day. At three o'clock, according to Cuthbert, he asked for a box of his to be brought, and distributed among the priests of the monastery "a few treasures" of his: "some pepper, and napkins, and some incense". That night he dictated a final sentence to the scribe, a boy named Wilberht, and died soon afterwards. Cuthbert's letter also relates a five-line poem in the vernacular that Bede composed on his deathbed, known as "Bede's Death Song". It is the most widely copied Old English poem, and appears in 45 manuscripts, but its attribution to Bede is not absolutely certain—not all manuscripts name Bede as the author, and the ones that do are of later origin than those that do not. Bede's remains may have been transferred to Durham Cathedral in the 11th century; his tomb there was looted in 1541, but the contents were probably re-interred in the Galilee chapel at the cathedral.

One further oddity in his writings is that in one of his works, the ''Commentary on the Seven Catholic Epistles'', he writes in a manner that gives the impression he was married. The section in question is the only one in that work that is written in first-person view. Bede says: "Prayers are hindered by the conjugal duty because as often as I perform what is due to my wife I am not able to pray." Another passage, in the ''Commentary on Luke'', also mentions a wife in the first person: "Formerly I possessed a wife in the lustful passion of desire and now I possess her in honourable sanctification and true love of Christ." The historian Benedicta Ward argues that these passages are Bede employing a rhetorical device.

Works

Bede wrote scientific, historical and theological works, reflecting the range of his writings from music and metrics to exegetical Scripture commentaries. He knew patristic literature, as well as Pliny the Elder, Virgil, Lucretius, Ovid, Horace and other classical writers. He knew some Greek and Hebrew. His Latin is generally clear, but his Biblical commentaries are more technical.

Bede's scriptural commentaries employed the allegorical method of interpretation and his history includes accounts of miracles, which to modern historians has seemed at odds with his critical approach to the materials in his history. Modern studies have shown the important role such concepts played in the world-view of Early Medieval scholars.

He dedicated his work on the Apocalypse and the ''De Temporum Ratione'' to the successor of Ceolfrid as abbot, Hwaetbert.

Modern historians have completed many studies of Bede's works. His life and work have been celebrated by a series of annual scholarly lectures at St. Paul's Church, Jarrow from 1958 to the present. The historian Walter Goffart says of Bede that he "holds a privileged and unrivalled place among first historians of Christian Europe".

Although Bede is mainly studied as a historian now, in his time his works on grammar, chronology, and biblical studies were as important as his historical and hagiographical works. The non-historical works contributed greatly to the Carolingian renaissance.

''Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum''

Bede's best-known work is the ''Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum'', or ''An Ecclesiastical History of the English People''. Completed in about 731,, Bede was aided in writing this book by Albinus, abbot of St Augustine's Abbey, Canterbury. The first of the five books begins with some geographical background, and then sketches the history of England, beginning with Caesar's invasion in 55 BC. A brief account of Christianity in Roman Britain, including the martyrdom of St Alban, is followed by the story of Augustine's mission to England in 597, which brought Christianity to the Anglo-Saxons. The second book begins with the death of Gregory the Great in 604, and follows the further progress of Christianity in Kent and the first attempts to evangelise Northumbria. These ended in disaster when Penda, the pagan king of Mercia, killed the newly Christian Edwin of Northumbria at the Battle of Hatfield Chase in about 632. The setback was temporary, and the third book recounts the growth of Christianity in Northumbria under kings Oswald of Northumbria and Oswy. The climax of the third book is the account of the Council of Whitby, traditionally seen as a major turning point in English history. The fourth book begins with the consecration of Theodore as Archbishop of Canterbury, and recounts Wilfrid's efforts to bring Christianity to the kingdom of Sussex. The fifth book brings the story up to Bede's day, and includes an account of missionary work in Frisia, and of the conflict with the British church over the correct dating of Easter. Bede wrote a preface for the work, in which he dedicates it to Ceolwulf, king of Northumbria. The preface mentions that Ceolwulf received an earlier draft of the book; presumably Ceolwulf knew enough Latin to understand it, and he may even have been able to read it. The preface makes it clear that Ceolwulf had requested the earlier copy, and Bede had asked for Ceolwulf's approval; this correspondence with the king indicates that Bede's monastery had excellent connections among the Northumbrian nobility.

Sources

The monastery at Wearmouth-Jarrow had an excellent library. Both Benedict Biscop and Ceolfrith had acquired books from the Continent, and in Bede's day the monastery was a renowned centre of learning. It has been estimated that there were about 200 books in the monastic library.

For the period prior to Augustine's arrival in 597, Bede drew on earlier writers, including Solinus. He had access to two works of Eusebius: the ''Historia Ecclesiastica'', and also the ''Chronicon'', though he had neither in the original Greek; instead he had a Latin translation of the ''Historia'', by Rufinus, and Saint Jerome's translation of the ''Chronicon''. He also knew Orosius's ''Adversus Paganus'', and Gregory of Tours' ''Historia Francorum'', both Christian histories, as well as the work of Eutropius, a pagan historian. He used Constantius's ''Life of Germanus'' as a source for Germanus's visits to Britain. Bede's account of the invasion of the Anglo-Saxons is drawn largely from Gildas's ''De Excidio et Conquestu Britanniae''. Bede would also have been familiar with more recent accounts such as Eddius Stephanus's ''Life of Wilfrid'', and anonymous ''Lives'' of Gregory the Great and Cuthbert. He also drew on Josephus's ''Antiquities'', and the works of Cassiodorus, and there was a copy of the ''Liber Pontificalis'' in Bede's monastery. Bede quotes from several classical authors, including Cicero, Plautus, and Terence, but he may have had access to their work via a Latin grammar rather than directly. However, it is clear he was familiar with the works of Virgil and with Pliny the Elder's ''Natural History'', and his monastery also owned copies of the works of Dionysius Exiguus. He probably drew his account of St. Alban from a life of that saint which has not survived. He acknowledges two other lives of saints directly; one is a life of Fursa, and the other of St. Æthelburh; the latter no longer survives. He also had access to a life of Ceolfrith. Some of Bede's material came from oral traditions, including a description of the physical appearance of Paulinus of York, who had died nearly 90 years before Bede's ''Historia Ecclesiastica'' was written.

Bede also had correspondents who supplied him with material. Albinus, the abbot of the monastery in Canterbury, provided much information about the church in Kent, and with the assistance of Nothhelm, at that time a priest in London, obtained copies of Gregory the Great's correspondence from Rome relating to Augustine's mission. Almost all of Bede's information regarding Augustine is taken from these letters. Bede acknowledged his correspondents in the preface to the ''Historia Ecclesiastica''; he was in contact with Daniel, the Bishop of Winchester, for information about the history of the church in Wessex, and also wrote to the monastery at Lastingham for information about Cedd and Chad. Bede also mentions an Abbot Esi as a source for the affairs of the East Anglian church, and Bishop Cynibert for information about Lindsey.

The historian Walter Goffart argues that Bede based the structure of the ''Historia'' on three works, using them as the framework around which the three main sections of the work were structured. For the early part of the work, up until the Gregorian mission, Goffart feels that Bede used Gildas's ''De excidio''. The second section, detailing the Gregorian mission of Augustine of Canterbury was framed on the anonymous ''Life of Gregory the Great'' written at Whitby. The last section, detailing events after the Gregorian mission, Goffart feels were modelled on Stephen of Ripon's ''Life of Wilfrid''. Most of Bede's informants for information after Augustine's mission came from the eastern part of Britain, leaving significant gaps in the knowledge of the western areas, which were those areas likely to have a native Briton presence.

Models and style

Bede's stylistic models included some of the same authors from whom he drew the material for the earlier parts of his history. His introduction imitates the work of Orosius, and his title is an echo of Eusebius's ''Historia Ecclesiastica''. Bede also followed Eusebius in taking the ''Acts of the Apostles'' as the model for the overall work: where Eusebius used the ''Acts'' as the theme for his description of the development of the church, Bede made it the model for his history of the Anglo-Saxon church. Bede quoted his sources at length in his narrative, as Eusebius had done. Bede also appears to have taken quotes directly from his correspondents at times. For example, he almost always uses the terms "Australes" and "Occidentales" for the South and West Saxons respectively, but in a passage in the first book he uses "Meridiani" and "Occidui" instead, as perhaps his informant had done. At the end of the work, Bede added a brief autobiographical note; this was an idea taken from Gregory of Tours' earlier ''History of the Franks''.

Bede's work as a hagiographer, and his detailed attention to dating, were both useful preparations for the task of writing the ''Historia Ecclesiastica''. His interest in computus, the science of calculating the date of Easter, was also useful in the account he gives of the controversy between the British and Anglo-Saxon church over the correct method of obtaining the Easter date.

Bede's Latin has been praised for its clarity, but his style in the ''Historia Ecclesiastica'' is not simple. He knew rhetoric, and often used figures of speech and rhetorical forms which cannot easily be reproduced in translation, depending as they often do on the connotations of the Latin words. However, unlike contemporaries such as Aldhelm, whose Latin is full of difficulties, Bede's own text is easy to read. In the words of Charles Plummer, one of the best-known editors of the ''Historia Ecclesiastica'', Bede's Latin is "clear and limpid ... it is very seldom that we have to pause to think of the meaning of a sentence ... Alcuin rightly praises Bede for his unpretending style."

Intent

Bede's primary intention in writing the ''Historia Ecclesiastica'' was to show the growth of the united church throughout England. The native Britons, whose Christian church survived the departure of the Romans, earn Bede's ire for refusing to help convert the Saxons; by the end of the ''Historia'' the English, and their Church, are dominant over the Britons. This goal, of showing the movement towards unity, explains Bede's animosity towards the British method of calculating Easter: much of the ''Historia'' is devoted to a history of the dispute, including the final resolution at the Synod of Whitby in 664. Bede is also concerned to show the unity of the English, despite the disparate kingdoms that still existed when he was writing. He also wants to instruct the reader by spiritual example, and to entertain, and to the latter end he adds stories about many of the places and people about which he wrote.

Bede's extensive use of miracles is disconcerting to the modern reader who thinks of Bede as a more or less reliable historian, but men of the time accepted miracles as a matter of course. However, Bede, like Gregory the Great whom Bede quotes on the subject in the ''Historia'', felt that faith brought about by miracles was a stepping stone to a higher, truer faith, and that as a result miracles had their place in a work designed to instruct.

Omissions and biases

Bede is somewhat reticent about the career of Wilfrid, a contemporary and one of the most prominent clerics of his day. This may be because Wilfrid's opulent lifestyle was uncongenial to Bede's monastic mind; it may also be that the events of Wilfrid's life, divisive and controversial as they were, simply did not fit with Bede's theme of the progression to a unified and harmonious church.

Bede's account of the early migrations of the Angles and Saxons to England omits any mention of a movement of those peoples across the channel from Britain to Brittany described by Procopius, who was writing in the sixth century. Frank Stenton describes this omission as "a scholar's dislike of the indefinite"; traditional material that could not be dated or used for the Bede's didactic purposes had no interest for him.

Bede was a Northumbrian, and this tinged his work with a local bias. The sources he had access to gave him less information about the west of England than for other areas. He says relatively little about the achievements of Mercia and Wessex, omitting, for example, any mention of Boniface, a West Saxon missionary to the continent of some renown and of whom Bede had almost certainly heard, though Bede does discuss Northumbrian missionaries to the continent. He also is parsimonious in his praise for Aldhelm, a West Saxon who had done much to convert the native Britons to the Roman form of Christianity. He lists seven kings of the Anglo-Saxons whom he regards as having held ''imperium'', or overlordship; only one king of Wessex, Ceawlin, is listed, and none from Mercia, though elsewhere he acknowledges the secular power several of the Mercians held.

Bede relates the story of Augustine's mission from Rome, and tells how the British clergy refused to assist Augustine in the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons. This, combined with the Gildas's negative assessment of the British church at the time of the Anglo-Saxon invasions, led Bede to a very critical view of the native church. However, Bede ignores the fact that at the time of Augustine's mission, the history between the two was one of warfare and conquest, which, in the words of Barbara Yorke, would have naturally "curbed any missionary impulses towards the Anglo-Saxons from the British clergy."

Use of ''Anno Domini''

At the time Bede wrote the ''Historia Ecclesiastica'', there were two common ways of referring to dates. One was to use indictions, which were 15-year cycles, counting from 312 AD. There were three different varieties of indiction, each starting on a different day of the year. The other approach was to use regnal years—the reigning Roman emperor, for example, or the ruler of whichever kingdom was under discussion. This meant that in discussing conflicts between kingdoms, the date would have to be given in the regnal years of all the kings involved. Bede used both these approaches on occasion, but adopted a third method as his main approach to dating: the ''anno domini'' method invented by Dionysius Exiguus. Although Bede did not invent this method, his adoption of it, and his promulgation of it in ''De Temporum Ratione'', his work on chronology, is the main reason why it is now so widely used.

Assessment

The ''Historia Ecclesiastica'' was copied often in the Middle Ages, and about 160 manuscripts containing it survive. About half of those are located on the European continent, rather than on the British Isles. Most of the 8th- and 9th-century texts of Bede's ''Historia'' come from the northern parts of the Carolingian Empire. This total does not include manuscripts with only a part of the work, of which another 100 or so survive. It was printed for the first time between 1474 and 1482, probably at Strasbourg, France. Modern historians have studied the ''Historia'' extensively, and a number of editions have been produced. For many years, early Anglo-Saxon history was essentially a retelling of the ''Historia'', but recent scholarship has focused as much on what Bede did not write as what he did. The belief that the ''Historia'' was the culmination of Bede's works, the aim of all his scholarship, a belief common among historians in the past, is no longer accepted by most scholars.

Modern historians and editors of Bede have been lavish in their praise of his achievement in the ''Historia Ecclesiastica''. Stenton regarded it as one of the "small class of books which transcend all but the most fundamental conditions of time and place", and regarded its quality as dependent on Bede's "astonishing power of co-ordinating the fragments of information which came to him through tradition, the relation of friends, or documentary evidence ... In an age where little was attempted beyond the registration of fact, he had reached the conception of history."

The ''Historia Ecclesiastica'' has given Bede a high reputation, but his concerns were different from those of a modern writer of history. His focus on the history of the organisation of the English church, and on heresies and the efforts made to root them out, led him to exclude the secular history of kings and kingdoms except where a moral lesson could be drawn or where they illuminated events in the church. Besides the ''Anglo-Saxon Chronicle'', the medieval writers William of Malmesbury, Henry of Huntingdon, and Geoffrey of Monmouth used his works as sources and inspirations. Early modern writers, such as Polydore Virgil and Matthew Parker, the Elizabethan Archbishop of Canterbury, also utilised the ''Historia'', and his works were used by both Protestant and Catholic sides in the Wars of Religion.

Some historians have questioned the reliability of some of Bede's accounts. One historian, Charlotte Behr, feels that the ''Historia's'' account of the arrival of the Germanic invaders in Kent should not be considered to relate what actually happened, but rather relates myths that were current in Kent during Bede's time.

It is likely that Bede's work, because it was so widely copied, discouraged others from writing histories and may even have led to the disappearance of manuscripts containing older historical works.

Other historical works

Chronicles

As Chapter 66 of his ''On the Reckoning of Time'', in 725 Bede wrote the ''Greater Chronicle'' (''chronica maiora''), which sometimes circulated as a separate work. For recent events the ''Chronicle'', like his ''Ecclesiastical History'', relied upon Gildas, upon a version of the Liber pontificalis current at least to the papacy of Pope Sergius I (687–701), and other sources. For earlier events he drew on Eusebius's ''Chronikoi Kanones.'' The dating of events in the ''Chronicle'' is inconsistent with his other works, using the era of creation, the anno mundi.

Lives

His other historical works included lives of the abbots of Wearmouth and Jarrow, as well as verse and prose lives of Saint Cuthbert of Lindisfarne, an adaptation of Paulinus of Nola's ''Life of St Felix'', and a translation of the Greek ''Passion of St Anastasius''. He also created a listing of saints, the ''Martyrology''.

Theological works

In his own time, Bede was as well known for his biblical commentaries and exegetical, as well as other theological works. The majority of his writings were of this type, and covered the Old Testament and the New Testament. Most survived the Middle Ages, but a few were lost. It was for his theological writings that he earned the title of ''Doctor Anglorum'', and why he was made a saint.

Bede was not an innovative religious thinker. He made no original writings or thoughts on the beliefs of the church, instead working to synthesise and transmit the learning from his predecessors. In order to do this, he learned Greek, and attempted to learn Hebrew. He spent time reading and rereading both the Old and the New Testaments. He mentions that he studied from a text of Jerome's Vulgate, which itself was from the Hebrew text. He also studied both the Latin and the Greek Fathers of the Church. In the monastic library at Jarrow were a number of books by theologians, including works by Basil, Cassian, John Chrysostom, Isidore of Seville, Origen, Gregory of Nazianzus, Augustine of Hippo, Jerome, Pope Gregory I, Ambrose of Milan, Cassiodorus, and Cyprian. He used these, in conjunction with the Biblical texts themselves, to write his commentaries and other theological works. He had a Latin translation by Evagrius of Athanasius's ''Life of Antony'', and a copy of Sulpicius Severus' ''Life of St. Martin''. He also used lesser known writers, such as Fulgentius, Julian of Eclanum, Tyconius, and Prosperius. Bede was the first to refer to Jerome, Augustine, Pope Gregory and Ambrose as the four Latin Fathers of the Church. It is clear from Bede's own comments that he felt his job was to explain to his students and readers the theology and thoughts of the Church Fathers.

Bede also wrote homilies, works written to explain theology used in worship services. Bede wrote homilies not only on the major Christian festivals such as Advent, Lent or Easter, but on other subjects such as anniversaries of significant events.

Both types of Bede's theological works circulated widely in the Middle Ages. A number of his biblical commentaries were incorporated into the ''Glossa Ordinaria'', an 11th-century collection of biblical commentaries. Some of Bede's homilies were collected by Paul the Deacon, and they were used in that form in the Monastic Office. Saint Boniface used Bede's homilies in his missionary efforts on the continent.

Bede sometimes included in his theological books an acknowledgement of the predecessors on whose works he drew. In two cases he left instructions that his marginal notes, which gave the details of his sources, should be preserved by the copyist, and he may have originally added marginal comments about his sources to others of his works. Where he does not specify, it is still possible to identify books that he must have had access to by quotations that he uses. A full catalogue of the library available to Bede in the monastery cannot be reconstructed, but it is possible to tell, for example, that Bede was very familiar with the works of Virgil. There is little evidence that he had access to any other of the pagan Latin writers–he quotes many of these writers but the quotes are almost all to be found in the Latin grammars that were common in his day, one or more of which would certainly have been at the monastery. Another difficulty is that manuscripts of early writers were often incomplete: it is apparent that Bede had access to Pliny's ''Encyclopedia'', for example, but it seems that the version he had was missing book xviii, as he would almost certainly have quoted from it in his ''De temporum ratione''.

Works on the Old Testament

The works dealing with the Old Testament included ''Commentary on Samuel'', ''Commentary on Genesis'', ''Commentaries on Ezra and Nehemiah'', ''On the Temple'', ''On the Tabernacle'', ''Commentaries on Tobit'', ''Commentaries on Proverbs'', ''Commentaries on the Song of Songs'', ''Commentaries on the Canticle of Habakkuk'', The works on Ezra, the Tabernacle and the Temple were especially influenced by Gregory the Great's writings. He was also the one responsible for replacing the title God in the Hebrew texts to read 'Lord of Hosts.'

Works on the New Testament

Bede's works included ''Commentary on Revelation'', ''Commentary on the Catholic Epistles'', ''Commentary on Acts'', ''Reconsideration on the Books of Acts'', ''On the Gospel of Mark'', ''On the Gospel of Luke'', and ''Homilies on the Gospels''.

Works on historical and astronomical chronology

''De temporibus'', or ''On Time'', written in about 703, provides an introduction to the principles of Easter computus. This was based on parts of Isidore of Seville's ''Etymologies'', and Bede also include a chronology of the world which was derived from Eusebius, with some revisions based on Jerome's translation of the bible. In about 723, Bede wrote a longer work on the same subject, ''On the Reckoning of Time'', which was influential throughout the Middle Ages. He also wrote several shorter letters and essays discussing specific aspects of computus.

''On the Reckoning of Time'' (''De temporum ratione'') included an introduction to the traditional ancient and medieval view of the cosmos, including an explanation of how the spherical earth influenced the changing length of daylight, of how the seasonal motion of the Sun and Moon influenced the changing appearance of the New Moon at evening twilight, and a quantitative relation between the changes of the Tides at a given place and the daily motion of the moon. Since the focus of his book was calculation, Bede gave instructions for computing the date of Easter and the related time of the Easter Full Moon, for calculating the motion of the Sun and Moon through the zodiac, and for many other calculations related to the calendar. He gives some information about the months of the Anglo-Saxon calendar in chapter XV. Any codex of Bede's Easter cycle is normally found together with a codex of his "De Temporum Ratione".

For calendric purposes, Bede made a new calculation of the age of the world since the creation, which he dated as 3952 BC. Due to his innovations in computing the age of the world, he was accused of heresy at the table of Bishop Wilfrid, his chronology being contrary to accepted calculations. Once informed of the accusations of these "lewd rustics," Bede refuted them in his Letter to Plegwin.

In addition to these works on astronomical timekeeping, he also wrote ''De natura rerum'', or ''On the Nature of Things'', modelled in part after the work of the same title by Isidore of Seville. His works were so influential that late in the 9th century Notker the Stammerer, a monk of the Monastery of St. Gall in Switzerland, wrote that "God, the orderer of natures, who raised the Sun from the East on the fourth day of Creation, in the sixth day of the world has made Bede rise from the West as a new Sun to illuminate the whole Earth".

Educational works

Bede wrote some works designed to help teach grammar in the abbey school. One of these was his ''De arte metrica'', a discussion of the composition of Latin verse, drawing on previous grammarians work. It was based on Donatus' ''De pedibus'' and Servius' ''De finalibus'', and used examples from Christian poets as well as Virgil. It became a standard text for the teaching of Latin verse during the next few centuries. Bede dedicated this work to Cuthbert, apparently a student, for he is named "beloved son" in the dedication, and Bede says "I have laboured to educate you in divine letters and ecclesiastical statutes" Another textbook of Bede's is the ''De orthographia'', a work on orthography, designed to help a medieval reader of Latin with unfamiliar abbreviations and words from classical Latin works. Although it could serve as a textbook, it appears to have been mainly intended as a reference work. The exact date of composition for both of these works is unknown.

Another educational work is ''De schematibus et tropis sacrae scripturae'', which discusses the Bible's use of rhetoric. Bede was familiar with pagan authors such as Virgil, but it was not considered appropriate to teach grammar from such texts, and in ''De schematibus ...'' Bede argues for the superiority of Christian texts. Similarly, his text on poetic metre uses only Christian poetry for examples.

Vernacular poetry

According to his disciple Cuthbert, Bede was also ''doctus in nostris carminibus'' ("learned in our songs"). Cuthbert's letter on Bede's death, the ''Epistola Cuthberti de obitu Bedae'', moreover, commonly is understood to indicate that Bede also composed a five line vernacular poem known to modern scholars as ''Bede’s Death Song''

: And he used to repeat that sentence from St. Paul “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God,” and many other verses of Scripture, urging us thereby to awake from the slumber of the soul by thinking in good time of our last hour. And in our own language,—for he was familiar with English poetry,—speaking of the soul’s dread departure from the body:

{| cellpadding="10" style="margin:auto;" |- | Facing that enforced journey, no man can be More prudent than he has good call to be, If he consider, before his going hence, What for his spirit of good hap or of evil After his day of death shall be determined. | Fore ðæm nedfere nænig wiorðe ðonc snottora ðon him ðearf siæ to ymbhycgenne ær his hinionge hwæt his gastæ godes oððe yfles æfter deað dæge doemed wiorðe.: |}

As Opland notes, however, it is not entirely clear that Cuthbert is attributing this text to Bede: most manuscripts of the letter do not use a finite verb to describe Bede's presentation of the song, and the theme was relatively common in Old English and Anglo-Latin literature. The fact that Cuthbert's description places the performance of the Old English poem in the context of a series of quoted passages from Sacred Scripture, indeed, might be taken as evidence simply that Bede also cited analogous vernacular texts. On the other hand, the inclusion of the Old English text of the poem in Cuthbert’s Latin letter, the observation that Bede "was learned in our song," and the fact that Bede composed a Latin poem on the same subject all point to the possibility of his having written it. By citing the poem directly, Cuthbert seems to imply that its particular wording was somehow important, either since it was a vernacular poem endorsed by a scholar who evidently frowned upon secular entertainment or because it is a direct quotation of Bede’s last original composition.

Veneration

There is no evidence for cult being paid to Bede in England in the 8th century. One reason for this may be that he died on the feast day of Augustine of Canterbury. Later, when he was venerated in England, he was either commemorated after Augustine on 26 May, or his feast was moved to 27 May. However, he was venerated outside England, mainly through the efforts of Saint Boniface and Alcuin, both of whom promoted the cult on the Continent. Boniface wrote repeatedly back to England during his missionary efforts, requesting copies of Bede's theological works. Alcuin, who was taught at the school set up in York by Bede's pupil Egbert, praised Bede as an example for monks to follow and was instrumental in disseminating Bede's works to all of Alcuin's friends. Bede's cult became prominent in England during the 10th-century revival of monasticism, and by the 14th century had spread to many of the cathedrals of England. Wulfstan, Bishop of Worcester (c. 1008–1095) was a particular devotee of Bede's, dedicating a church to him in 1062, which was Wulfstan's first undertaking after his consecration as bishop.

His body was stolen from Jarrow and transferred to Durham Cathedral around 1020, where it was placed in the same tomb with Saint Cuthbert of Lindisfarne. Later they were moved to a shrine in Galilee Chapel at Durham Cathedral in 1370. The shrine was destroyed during the English Reformation, but the bones were reburied in the chapel. In 1831 the bones were dug up and then reburied in a new tomb, which is still there. Other relics were claimed by York, Glastonbury and Fulda.

His scholarship and importance to Catholicism were recognised in 1899 when he was declared a Doctor of the Church, and was declared a sanctus in 1935. He is the only Englishman named a Doctor of the Church. He is also the only Englishman in Dante's Paradise (''Paradiso'' X.130), mentioned among theologians and doctors of the church in the same canto as Isidore of Seville and the Scot Richard of St. Victor.

His feast day was included in the General Roman Calendar in 1899, for celebration on 27 May rather than on his date of death, 26 May which was then the feast day of Pope Saint Gregory VII; however, the 1969 calendar reforms allowed Bede's feast day to move to its proper day. He is venerated in both the Anglican and Roman Catholic Church, with a feast day of 25 May.

Bede became known as ''Venerable Bede'' (Lat.: Beda Venerabilis) by the 9th century, but this was not linked to consideration for sainthood by the Roman Catholic Church. According to a legend the epithet was miraculously supplied by angels, thus completing his unfinished epitaph. It is first utilised in connection with Bede in the 9th century, where Bede was grouped with others who were called "venerable" at two ecclesiastical councils held at Aix in 816 and 836. Paul the Deacon then referred to him as venerable consistently. By the 11th and 12th century, it had become commonplace. However, there are no descriptions of Bede by that term right after his death.

See also

List of works by Bede

List of manuscripts of Bede's Historia Ecclesiastica

Bede's World museum in Jarrow

Works of Bede on Wikisource

Notes

References

Sources

Primary sources

Bede, ''Hist. eccl. · Venerabilis Baedae opera historica'', ed. C. Plummer, 2 vols. (1896)

(Parallel Latin text and English translation with English notes.)

Secondary sources

Dorey, T.A. (ed.) (1966). ''Latin Historians''. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.

External links

Bede's World: the museum of early medieval Northumbria at Jarrow

The Venerable Bede from In Our Time (BBC Radio 4)

''Ecclesiastical History of the English People'', Books 1–5, L.C. Jane's 1903 Temple Classics translation. From the Internet Medieval Sourcebook.

Bede's Ecclesiastical History and the Continuation of Bede (pdf), at CCEL, edited & translated by A.M. Sellar.

Saint Bede, complete works, in Latin, with historical works also in English at ''The Online Library of Liberty''

Category:670s births Category:735 deaths Category:8th-century Christian saints Category:8th-century historians Category:8th-century writers Category:Anglo-Saxon poets Category:Anglo-Saxon writers Category:Bible translators Category:Burials at Monkwearmouth-Jarrow Abbey, Northumbria Category:Christian theologians Category:Chronologists Category:Doctors of the Church Category:Early medieval Latin writers Category:English Christian monks Category:English theologians Category:Hagiographers Category:Northumbrian saints Category:Old English poetry Category:People from Jarrow Category:People from Sunderland, Tyne and Wear Category:Renewers of the church Category:Roman Catholic saints Category:Roman Catholic theologians Category:Anglican saints Category:Trope theorists

ang:Bēda be:Беда Вялебны be-x-old:Бэда Вялебны br:Beda Venerabilis bg:Беда Достопочтени ca:Beda cs:Beda Venerabilis cy:Beda da:Beda de:Beda Venerabilis el:Βέδας es:Beda eo:Bede (historiisto) fa:سینت بید fr:Bède le Vénérable fy:Beda gl:Beda ko:베다 베네라빌리스 hy:Բեդա Պատվելի hr:Beda Časni id:Beda is:Beda prestur it:Beda il Venerabile he:בדה ונרביליס sw:Bede Mheshimiwa la:Beda lt:Beda hu:Szent Béda ml:ബീഡ് nl:Beda ja:ベーダ・ヴェネラビリス no:Beda den ærverdige pl:Beda Czcigodny pt:Beda ro:Beda Venerabilul ru:Беда Достопочтенный sq:Shën Beda i Nderuari simple:Bede sk:Beda Venerabilis sr:Беда Поштовани sh:Beda Uvaženi fi:Beda Venerabilis sv:Beda venerabilis tl:San Beda th:นักบุญบีด tr:Bede uk:Беда Преподобний zh:比德

Name	Bede Griffiths
Birth name	Alan Richard Griffiths
Birth date	December 17, 1906
Birth place	Walton-on-Thames, England
Death date	May 13, 1993
Death place	Shantivanam, in Tamil Nadu, India
Resting place coordinates
Nationality	British
Ethnicity	Caucasian
Citizenship	U. K.
Other names	Swami Dayananda
Known for	Integral thought
Alma mater	Magdalen College, Oxford
Occupation	Benedictine Monk
Religion	Roman Catholic}}

Bede Griffiths (17 December 1906 – 13 May 1993), born Alan Richard Griffiths and also known as Swami Dayananda (Bliss of Compassion), was a British-born Benedictine monk who lived in ashrams in South India. He was born at Walton-on-Thames, England and studied literature at Magdalen College, Oxford under professor and Christian apologist C. S. Lewis, who became a lifelong friend. Griffiths recounts the story of his conversion in 1931 to Roman Catholicism while a student at Oxford in his autobiography ''The Golden String''.

Biography

In December 1932, Griffiths joined the Benedictine monastery of Prinknash Abbey, where he was ordained to the priesthood in 1940. He spent some time in the sister abbey in Scotland but, after two decades of community life, moved to Kengeri in Bangalore, India in 1955 with the goal of building a monastery there. That project was unsuccessful.

In 1958, he helped Francis Acharya to establish Kristiya Sanyasa Samaj, Kurisumala Ashram (Mountain of the Cross), a Syriac rite monastery of Syro-Malankara Catholic Church in Kerala. In 1968 he moved to the Shantivanam (Forest of Peace) Ashram in Tamil Nadu, the ashram had been founded by the French Benedictine monk Abhishiktananda in 1950. Although he remained a Catholic monk he adopted the trappings of Hindu monastic life and entered into dialogue with Hinduism. Griffiths wrote twelve books on Hindu-Christian dialogue. Griffiths was a part of the Christian Ashram Movement.

Griffiths was a proponent of integral thought, which attempts to harmonize scientific and spiritual world views. In a 1983 interview he stated,

Griffiths died at Shantivanam in 1993, aged 86. The archives of the Bede Griffiths Trust are located at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California.

Notes

Books

By Griffiths

''The Golden String: An Autobiography'', (1954), Templegate Publishers, 1980 edition: ISBN 0-87243-163-0, Medio Media, 2003: ISBN 0-9725627-3-7

''Christ in India: Essays Towards a Hindu-Christian Dialogue'' (1967), Templegate Publishers, 1984, ISBN 0-87243-134-7

''Return to the Center'', (1976), Templegate Publishers, 1982, ISBN 0-87243-112-6

''Marriage of East and West: A Sequel to The Golden String'', Templegate Publishers, 1982, ISBN 0-87243-105-3

''Cosmic Revelation: The Hindu Way to God'', Templegate Publishers, 1983, ISBN 0-87243-119-3

''A New Vision of Reality: Western Science, Eastern Mysticism and Christian Faith'', Templegate Publishers, 1990, ISBN 0-87243-180-0

''River of Compassion: A Christian Commentary on the Bhagavad Gita'', (1987), Element Books, 1995 reprint: ISBN 0-8264-0769-2

''Bede Griffiths'', Templegate Publishers, 1993, ISBN 0-87243-199-1

''The New Creation in Christ: Christian Meditation and Community'', Templegate Publishers, 1994, ISBN 0-87243-209-2

(co-editor with Roland R. Ropers), ''Psalms for Christian Prayer'', Harpercollins, 1996, ISBN 0-00-627956-2

John Swindells (editor), ''A Human Search: Bede Griffiths Reflects on His Life: An Oral History'', Triumph Books, 1997, ISBN 0-89243-935-1 (from 1992 Australian television documentary)

Bruno Barnhart (editor), ''The One Light: Bede Griffiths' Principle Writings'', Templegate Publishers, 2001, ISBN 0-87243-254-8

Thomas Matus (editor), ''Bede Griffiths: Essential Writings'', Orbis Books, 2004, ISBN 1-57075-200-1

About Griffiths

Kathryn Spink, ''A Sense of the Sacred: A Biography of Bede Griffiths'', Orbis Books, 1989. ISBN 0-88344-442-9

Beatrice Bruteau (ed.), ''The Other Half of My Soul: Bede Griffiths and the Hindu-Christian Dialogue'', Quest Books, 1996. ISBN 0-8356-0717-8 (Essays in honor of Griffiths by Matthew Fox, Thomas Keating, Rupert Sheldrake, Thomas Berry, Judson Trapnell, Wayne Teasdale, and others).

Jesu Rajan, ''Bede's Journey to the Beyond'', Bangalore, India: Asian Trading Corporation, 1997. ISBN 81-7086-211-6

Judson B. Trapnell, ''Bede Griffiths. A Life of Dialogue'', Albany: State University of New York Press (=SUNY Press), 2001. (Collection: SUNY Series in Religious Studies). ISBN 0-7914-4871-1

Wayne Teasdale, ''Bede Griffiths: An Introduction to His Interspiritual Thought'', Skylight Paths Publishing, 2003. ISBN 1-893361-77-2

Shirley du Boulay, ''Beyond the Darkness: A Biography of Bede Griffiths'', Alresford, UK: O Books, 2003. ISBN 1-903816-16-5.

Albano Fernandes, ''The Hindu Mystical Experience: A Comparative Study of the Approaches of R. C. Zaehner and Bede Griffiths''. New Delhi, India: Intercultural Publications, 2004.

Dion Forster, ''Christ at the centre: Discovering the Cosmic Christ in the spirituality of Bede Griffiths''. Kempton Park: AcadSA Publishers, 2008. ISBN 978-1-920212-24-7.

Pandikattu, Kuruvilla, ''Religious dialogue as hermeneutics: Bede Griffith's advaitic approach to religions, Cultural heritage and contemporary change''. (Series IIIB, South Asia). Washington, D.C.: Council for Research in Values and Philosophy, 2001. ISBN 1-56518-1395. Available online.

External links

Bede Griffiths Trust

Ram Swarup and Bede Griffiths ">Hindu-Christian Dialogue between Ram Swarup and Bede Griffiths

Profile of Bede Griffiths - This man is dangerous

"Some Men Should Have Mountains" tribute poem

Russian site about Bede Griffiths "Bede Griffiths, Henri Le Saux and Jules Monchanin Sangha"

Bede Griffiths writes about Authority in the Church

Critical review of Griffith's work from a Catholic Website

Category:1906 births Category:1993 deaths Category:Alumni of Magdalen College, Oxford Category:Benedictines Category:C. S. Lewis Category:Christian mystics Category:Converts to Roman Catholicism Category:English Christian missionaries Category:English Christian monks Category:English religious writers Category:English Roman Catholics Category:Integral thought Category:Roman Catholic writers Category:Syro-Malankara Catholic Church

de:Bede Griffiths es:Bede Griffiths pl:Bede Griffiths sv:Bede Griffiths

name	Bede Durbridge
birth date	February 23, 1983
birth place	Brisbane, Queensland, Australia
residence	Currumbin, Queensland, Australia
height
weight
stance	Natural (regular) foot
best year	2nd - 2008 ASP World Tour
career earnings	$750,601
sponsors	Fox), Mt Woodgee, Xcel Wetsuits, Freestyle watches, OAM surfboardsm SeaStradbroke
major achievements	1st - 2007 Triple Crown of Surfing Australian Male Surfer of the Year 2008 }}

Bede Durbidge (born 23 February 1983) is an Australian professional surfer. He is one of the most promising surfers of the ASP World Tour. Durbo ,Bej and The White Fijian are his nicknames.

Life

Bede Durbridge was born in Brisbane, Queensland. He began in the Australasian Junior Series, and after four years in the World Qualifying Series joined the World Championship Tour in 2005, being among the 45 best surfers in the world.

As a professional, his strongest achievement is winning the Boost Mobile Pro in Trestles, San Clemente, California. Only five waves was enough for him to defeat the seven-time champion Kelly Slater. He later came in second in the Quiksilver Pro Gold Coast of 2007. His total earning in the ASP World Tour so far is $231,385.

His wife is currently pregnant carrying their first child.

Victories

Rip Curl Pipeline Masters¹Boost Mobile Pro

colspan=4; style="background: blue; color: white" align="center"	ASP World Tour Wins
Year!!Event!!Venue!!Country
	Hang Loose Santa Catarina	Florianopolis, Santa Catarina (state)>Santa Catarina
2007 ASP World Tour	2007	|	Oahu	Hawaii
2006 ASP World Tour	2006	|	Trestles, San Clemente, California

Outside of the ASP World Tour:

2004: Nokia Lacanau Pacific Motion Pro, Lacanau - France

2003: Rip Curl Newquay Board Masters, Newquay - England

¹(Also winning the Triple Crown of Surfing)

External links

Bede Durbidge Official Homepage

Official site of Bede Durbidge in Mt. Woodgee

Category:Australian surfers Category:ASP World Tour surfers Category:1983 births Category:Living people

es:Bede Durbidge fr:Bede Durbidge

name	Kelly Slater
birth date	February 11, 1972
birth place	Cocoa Beach, Florida, U.S.
residence	Florida, California and Hawaii
height
weight
years active	1990–present
best year	Ranked 1st on the ASP World Tour, 1992, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 2005, 2006, 2008, 2010, 2011
career earnings	$3,030,755 (as of 2011)
sponsors	Quiksilver wetsuits and clothing, FCS fins and Komunity Project accessories
major achievements	11 time ASP World Champion Victories: 55World championship tour (WCT) surfing wins: 48
stance	Regular (natural) foot (left foot forward)
shapers	Al Merrick
quiver	5'6", 5'8", 5'10", 6'1", 6'3" and 6'6" boards when on the road
occupation	Actor
favorite waves	Kirra and Pipe
favorite maneuvers	Airs and barrels
website	kellyslater.com }}

Robert Kelly Slater (born February 11, 1972, Cocoa Beach, FL, USA) is an American professional surfer known for his competitive prowess and style. He has been crowned ASP World Champion a record 11 times, including 5 consecutive titles from 1994–98. He is the youngest (at age 20) and the oldest (at age 39) to win the title. Upon winning his 5th world title in 1997, Slater passed Australian surfing legend Mark Richards to become the most successful champion in the history of the sport. In 2007 he also became the all-time leader in career event wins by winning the Boost Mobile Pro event at Lower Trestles near San Clemente, California. The previous record was held by Slater's childhood hero, 3-time world champion Tom Curren. In addition to the ASP tour, Slater has also competed in the X-Games (in 2003 and 2004). After earlier being awarded the title prematurely as a result of a miscalculation by the ASP, on November 6, 2011 Slater officially won his eleventh ASP world title at the Rip Curl Pro Search San Francisco, by winning his 4th round heat. In May 2005, in the final heat of the Billabong Tahiti Pro contest at Teahupo'o, Slater became the first surfer ever to be awarded two perfect scores for a total 20 out of 20 points under the ASP two-wave scoring system. (The corresponding honor under the previous three-wave system belongs to fellow American Shane Beschen who achieved the feat in 1996.)

Since 1990, Slater has been sponsored primarily by surfwear industry giant Quiksilver. He exclusively rides Channel Islands surfboards equipped with his own signature series of FCS fins.

Biography

Early life and family

Slater was born on February 11, 1972 in Cocoa Beach, Florida, where he continues to reside. He has a teenage daughter named Taylor. He is of Irish and Syrian ancestry. He has an older brother, Sean, and a younger brother, Stephen.

In his spare time Slater enjoys playing the guitar,composing sonnets, and spending quality time with longtime girlfriend, Kalani Miller who often travels and supports him on the ASP World Tour. His favorite surf spots are Sandspit in California, Pipeline in Hawaii, Kirra in Australia, Jeffreys Bay in South Africa, Minis in Ireland, Taghazout in Morocco, Soup Bowls in Barbados, Sebastian Inlet near his home in Florida and Bilgola beach in the northern beaches of Sydney, Australia. his three favourite surfing buddys from Bilgola are Ian morrison, James Burfitt and Jose Viera. He is also an avid golfer, with a +2 handicap. Slater is interested in the sport of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. Some of his surfing inspirations are Tom Curren, Tom Carroll, Mark Occhilupo, Martin Potter, Andy Irons, Shane Dorian, Drew Phelps, Ken Wells, Hunter Collins, and Andrew Bloom.

Other projects

Slater played the recurring character Jimmy Slade on several episodes of the popular TV show ''Baywatch'' in the early 1990s . He appeared in an episode of the reality show The Girls Next Door, and has also starred in many surf films throughout his career.

In the late '90s Slater, along with friends and fellow pro surfers Rob Machado and Peter King, formed a band called The Surfers. The trio released an album in 1998 titled ''Songs From the Pipe'', a reference to the famous surf spot Pipeline on Oahu, Hawaii. Aside from his Love of surfing, Kelly also toured Australia with his band, performing in venues such as the Opera House, and parliament house. He was also given an honourary membership to the Rickson Cricket Club in northwest Sydney.

Slater performed a song with Ben Harper during Harper's concert in Santa Barbara. on August 1, 2006. He also performed "Rockin' in The Free World" with grunge band Pearl Jam on the July 7, 2006 in San Diego. In 1999, he appeared alongside Garbage singer Shirley Manson in the promotional video for the band's single "You Look So Fine". He played a man washed up on a seashore, then rescued by Manson.

A video game named Kelly Slater's Pro Surfer, by Treyarch and published by Activision, was released in 2002. Slater also appeared as a playable character in Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 prior to this, complete with a surfboard.

In 2003 Slater released his autobiography, ''Pipe Dreams: A Surfer's Journey''. In 2008 he released a second book with Phil Jarratt, entitled ''Kelly Slater: For the Love.''

Slater is passionate about preserving oceans globally and protecting temperate reefs in California through his relationship with Reef.

On May 8, 2010 the United States House of Representatives honored Slater in H. Res. 792 for his "outstanding and unprecedented achievements in the world of surfing and for being an ambassador of the sport and excellent role model." This resolution, sponsored by Florida representative Bill Posey and sponsored by 10 representatives, passed without objection by a voice vote.

Stats

WCT victories: 48

World titles: 11

On 9/15/07, Kelly Slater passed Tom Curren's long standing WCT tour victory record of 33 with his win at the Boost Mobile Pro at Lowers Trestles.

2011 Stats and results

World ranking: 2011 Champion Points: 68,100

Event results in 2011 Quiksilver Pro, Gold Coast (Snapper Rocks, Australia): 1st Rip Curl Pro, Bells Beach, (Victoria, Australia): 5th Billabong Rio Pro (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil): 1st Nike Pro US Open (Huntington Pier): 1st Billabong Pro Teahupoo (Teahupoo, Tahiti): 1st Quiksilver Pro New York (Long Beach, New York, USA): 2nd Hurley Pro Lower Trestles (California, USA): 1st Quiksilver Pro France (Hossegor, France): 5th Rip Curl Pro Portugal (Peniche, Portugal): 2nd Rip Curl Search (Ocean Beach, San Francisco, USA): 5th Billabong Pipeline Masters (Pipeline, Oahu, Hawaii): 3rd

2010 Stats and results

World ranking: 2010 Champion Points: 69000

Event results in 2010 Quiksilver Pro, Gold Coast (Snapper Rocks, Australia): 9th Rip Curl Pro, Bells Beach (Australia): 1st Hang Loose Pro (Santa Catarina, Brasil): 2nd Billabong Pro (Jeffreys Bay, South Africa): 17th Billabong Pro Teahupoo (Teahupoo, Tahiti): 3rd Hurley Pro (Lower Trestles, San Clemente, CA): 1st Quiksilver Pro France (Hossegor, France): 2nd Rip Curl Pro Portugal (Peniche, Portugal): 1st Rip Curl Pro Search 2010 (Middles Beach, Isabela, Puerto Rico): 1st Billabong Pipeline Masters (Pipeline, Oahu, Hawaii): 3rd

2009 Stats and results

World ranking: 6th. Points: 6136

Event results in 2009 Quiksilver Pro, Gold Coast (Snapper Rocks, Australia): 17th Rip Curl Pro, Bells Beach (Australia): 17th Billabong Pro, Tahiti (Teahupoo, Tahiti): 17th Hang Loose Pro (Santa Catarina, Brasil): 1st Billabong Pro (Jeffreys Bay, South Africa): 9th Hurley Pro (Lower Trestles, San Clemente, CA): 3rd Quiksilver Pro France (Hossegor, France): 5th Billabong Pro, Mundaka (Mundaka, Spain): 3rd Rip Curl Search (Peniche, Portugal): 17th Billabong Pipeline Masters (Pipeline, Oahu, Hawaii): 2nd

2008 Stats and results

World ranking: 2008 Champion Points: 8832

Event results Quiksilver Pro, Gold Coast (Snapper Rocks, Australia): 1st Rip Curl Pro, Bells Beach (Australia): 1st Billabong Pro, Tahiti (Teahupoo, Tahiti): 17th Globe Pro, Fiji (Tavarua, Fiji): 1st Billabong Pro, J-Bay (Jeffreys Bay, South Africa): 1st Rip Curl Search (Bali, Indonesia): 17th Boost Mobile Pro (Lower Trestles, San Clemente, CA): 1st Quiksilver Pro France (Hossegor, France): 2nd Billabong Pro, Mundaka (Mundaka, Spain): 9th Hang Loose Pro (Santa Catarina, Brasil): DNS Billabong Pipeline Masters (Pipeline, Oahu, Hawaii): 1st

History of wins

2011

Quiksilver Pro (Gold Coast, Australia)

Nike US Open (Huntington Beach, CA)

Billabong Pro Teahupoo (Teahupoo, Tahiti)

Hurley Pro Trestles (California, USA)

2010

Rip Curl Pro (Bells Beach, Australia)

Hurley Pro (Lower Trestles, California, USA)

Rip Curl Pro (Peniche, Portugal)

Rip Curl Search (Middles, Isabela, Puerto Rico)

2009

Hang Loose Pro (Santa Catarina, Brasil)

2008

Quiksilver Pro (Gold Coast, Australia)

Rip Curl Pro (Bells Beach, Australia)

Glove Pro Fiji (Cloudbreak, Restaurants – Tavarua, Fiji)

Billabong Pro J-Bay (Jeffrey's Bay, South Africa)

Boost Mobile Pro (Lower Trestles, San Clemente, California)

Billabong Pipeline Masters (Pipeline, North Shore Oahu, Hawaii)

2007

Boost Mobile Pro (Lower Trestles, San Clemente, California)

2006

Quiksilver Pro (Gold Coast, Australia)

Rip Curl Pro (Bells Beach, Australia)

2005

Billabong Pro (Teahupoo, Tahiti)

The Globe WCT (Fiji)

Billabong Pro (South Africa)

Boost Mobile Pro (Lower Trestles, San Clemente, California)

2004

Snickers Australian Open (QS)

Energy Australia Open (QS)

2003

Billabong Pro (Teahupoo, Tahiti)

Billabong Pro (South Africa)

Billabong Pro (Mundaka, Spain)

Nova Schin Festival (Brazil)

2002

The Quiksilver in Memory of Eddie Aikau (Specialty-Hawaii)

2000

Gotcha Tahiti Pro presented by Globe (Tahiti)

1999

Mountain Dew Pipe Masters (Hawaii)

1997

Coke Surf Classic (Australia)

Billabong Pro (Australia)

Tokushima Pro (Japan)

Marui Pro (Japan)

Kaiser Summer Surf WCT (Brazil)

Grand Slam (Specialty-Australia)

Typhoon Lagoon Surf Challenge (Specialty-USA)

1996

Coke Surf Classic (Australia)

Rip Curl Pro Saint Leu (Reunion Island)

CSI pres. Billabong Pro (South Africa)

U.S. Open (California)

Rip Curl Pro Hossegor (France)

Quiksilver Surfmasters (France)

Chiemsee Pipe Masters (Hawaii)

Sud Ouest Trophee (Specialty-France)

Da Hui Backdoor Shootout (Specialty-Hawaii)

1995

Quiksilver Pro (Indonesia)

Chiemsee Pipe Masters (Hawaii)

Triple Crown of Surfing (Specialty-Hawaii)

1994

Rip Curl Pro (Australia)

Gotcha Lacanau Pro (France)

Chiemsee Pipe Masters (Hawaii)

The Bud Surf Tour (WQS-USA)

The Bud Surf Tour (WQS-USA)

Sud Ouest Trophee (Specialty-France)

1993

Marui Pro (Japan)

1992

Rip Curl Pro Landes (France)

Marui Pipe Masters (Hawaii)

1990

Body Glove Surfbout Trestles (California)

Filmography

Films

''"Ultimate Wave Tahiti" (2010) ''"Bustin Down the Door" (2008) ''"One Track Mind" (2008) ''"Kelly Slater Letting Go" (2008) ''"Waveriders" 2008) ''"Surf's Up" (2007) ''"Down the Barrel" (2007) ''"Surfers – The Movie" (1990) ''"Bra Boys" (2007) ''"The Ocean" (2008) ''"One Night at McCool's" (2001) ''"Letting Go" (2006) ''"Young Guns 1, 2 & 3" (2004–2008) ''"Campaign 2" (2005) ''"Doped Youth" 'Groovy Avalon' (2004) ''"Kelly Slater in Black and White" (1991) ''"Endless Summer II" (1994) ''"Wave Warriors 3" ''"A Fly in the Champagne" (2009) (featuring Kelly Slater and Andy Irons) ''"Cloud 9" (2009) ''"Riding Giants" (2004) ''"Step into Liquid" (2003) ''"Thicker than Water" (2000) ''"Fighting Fear" (2011) ''"September Sessions" (2002)

Cameo appearance

''"Surf's Up" (2007)

Television

''Baywatch'', 10 episodes

''The Girls Next Door'', "Surf's Up" 1 episode

Bibliography

''Pipe Dreams: A Surfer's Journey'' (2003) ISBN 0060096292

''Kelly Slater: For the Love'' (2008) ISBN 0811862224

References

External links

Kelly Slater the Official Website

Kelly Slater Photo Gallery at Outside Online

Kelly Slater at the Internet Movie Database

Kelly Slater Pictures & Wallpapers

Kelly Slater Interview

Interview with Kelly Slater and Eddie Vedder Regarding Surfing and Their Friendship

Kelly Slater In SPIN's November Issue

Kelly Slater Shares His Memories of Rival Andy Irons at The Inertia

Kelly Slater isn't new world champ yet; ASP says it made an error

Category:1972 births Category:American surfers Category:American people of Syrian descent Category:American people of Irish descent Category:Laureus World Sports Awards winners Category:Living people Category:People from Cocoa Beach, Florida

cs:Kelly Slater de:Kelly Slater es:Kelly Slater eu:Kelly Slater fr:Kelly Slater it:Kelly Slater he:קלי סלייטר nl:Kelly Slater ja:ケリー・スレーター pl:Kelly Slater pt:Kelly Slater ru:Слейтер, Келли simple:Kelly Slater fi:Kelly Slater sv:Kelly Slater

Name	Burt Rutan
Birth date	June 17, 1943
Birth place	Estacada, Oregon,United States
Occupation	Aerospace Engineer
Spouse	Tonya Rutan
Children	}}

Elbert Leander "Burt" Rutan (born June 17, 1943) is an American aerospace engineer noted for his originality in designing light, strong, unusual-looking, energy-efficient aircraft. He is famous for his design of the record-breaking Voyager, which was the first plane to fly around the world without stopping or refueling, and the sub-orbital spaceplane SpaceShipOne, which won the Ansari X-Prize in 2004 for becoming the first privately funded spacecraft to enter the realm of space twice within a two week period. He has five aircraft on display in the National Air and Space Museum: SpaceShipOne, the Virgin Atlantic GlobalFlyer, Voyager, Quickie, and the VariEze.

Life and career

Born in 1943 in Estacada, Oregon, 30 miles southeast of Portland, and raised in Dinuba, California, Rutan displayed an early interest in aircraft design. By the time he was eight years old he was designing and building model aircraft. His first solo flight piloting an airplane was in an Aeronca Champ in 1959. In 1965 he graduated third in his class from the California Polytechnic State University (Cal Poly-SLO) with a BS degree in aeronautical engineering.

From 1965 to 1972 Rutan was a flight test project engineer for the U.S. Air Force at Edwards Air Force Base, working on nine separate projects including the LTV XC-142 VSTOL transport and spin tests of the McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom fighter. He left to become Director of Development of the BD-5 aircraft for Bede Aircraft in Newton, Kansas, a position he held until 1974.

Rutan returned to California in June 1974, to create the Rutan Aircraft Factory. In this business he designed and developed prototypes for several aircraft, mostly intended for amateur builders. His first design, executed while he was still at Bede, was the VariViggen, a two-seat pusher single-engine craft of canard configuration. The canard would become a feature of many Rutan designs, notably the very popular VariEze and Long-EZ.

In April 1982, Burt Rutan founded Scaled Composites, LLC, which has become one of the world's pre-eminent aircraft design and prototyping facilities. Scaled Composites is headquartered in Mojave, California, at the Mojave Air & Space Port. In 2005 he received the NAS Award in Aeronautical Engineering from the National Academy of Sciences.

In a 2010 interview, Rutan articulated his motivation for developing suborbital technology projects with SpaceShipOne and SpaceShipTwo. He was developing suborbital spaceflight technology because in this "we can achieve some breakthroughs," making such flight "orders of magnitude safer and orders of magnitude more affordable. I'm taking this step because I think achieving something that has never existed in manned spaceflight – and that is ''high volume'' and ''public access'' – I think it is important to do that and to do it as soon as possible."

Rutan is married to Tonya Rutan. He retired from Scaled Composites in April, 2011.

Air and space craft designs

Rutan has left an aircraft design legacy from 45 years of work, designing aircraft that are often quite dissimilar from their predecessors. "His airplanes and spacecraft take on all types of sleek shapes and sizes, looking more like the work of a sculptor than an engineer. In all, Rutan has come up with 367 individual concepts — of which 45 have flown."

Homebuilts

VariViggen and VariViggen SP

His first design, the VariViggen, which he began building in his garage in 1968, first flew in April 1972. It had the rear wing, forward canard, and pusher configuration design elements which became his trademarks. In lieu of wind tunnel testing, Rutan developed the aerodynamic parameters for the VariViggen using a model rigged atop his station wagon, and measuring the forces while driving on empty roads.

The VariViggen was the Rutan model 27. A new set of outer wings, with winglets, was later developed by Rutan for the VariViggen, producing the VariViggen SP, Rutan model 32. The VariViggen was named in honor of the Saab 37 Viggen, a canard-configured fighter jet developed in Sweden. One VariViggen, built in France and named Micro Star, was powered by two Microturbo TRS-18 jet engines in lieu of the usual piston engine.

VariEze and Long-EZ

The VariViggen design led to the successful Rutan VariEze (pronounced "very easy") homebuilt experimental aircraft designs, in which he pioneered the use of moldless glass-reinforced plastic construction in homebuilts. In 1975 his brother Dick Rutan set a world distance record in the under-500 kg (1100 lb) class in the VariEze, and these aircraft went on to set other world records in this class. They were also the first aircraft to fly with NASA-developed winglets. The Long-EZ had a range of , over twice that of the VariEze. The original VW-powered VariEze used by Dick Rutan to set the aforementioned records was the Rutan model 31. The later, standard homebuilt VariEze was the Rutan model 33. Most VariEzes have been powered by Continental O-200 engines. Rutan later revised the VariEze design, providing more volume for fuel and cargo, resulting in the Rutan model 61 Long-EZ, designed to be powered by a Lycoming O-235, although some have used Lycoming O-320s or Lycoming O-360s. The Long-EZ also has a revised wing spar design that is not subject to the 2.5g positive, 1.5g negative, maximum load factor limit applied to the VariEze after the discovery of problems with some VariEze wings.

Ames AD-1

In the 1980s NASA issued a contract to Ames Industrial Company of Bohemia, New York to develop a small, low-cost aircraft to investigate Robert T. Jones's (a NASA researcher at NASA's Ames Research Center) oblique wing concept. Ames turned to Rutan, who designed a small, fiberglass airframe, powered by two Microturbo TRS-18 jet engines. This was the Rutan model 35, the Ames AD-1. After completion of the test program, the AD-1 was retired and is now on exhibit in the Hiller Aviation Museum in San Carlos, California.

Quickie

Rutan was approached by Gene Sheehan and Tom Jewett to develop a single-seat personal sport aircraft. A tandem wing configuration resulted from their collaboration. The aircraft was powered by an 18 hp Onan industrial engine. The prototype was the Rutan model 49. Quickie Aircraft then marketed a slightly improved version as the Quickie. This was the Rutan model 54 Quickie.

Two derivatives of the Quickie were subsequently developed, both expanded to include two seats. Quickie Aircraft had Gary LaGare develop the Q2, while Viking Aircraft developed the Viking Dragonfly.

Grizzly

Rutan designed the model 72 Grizzly to investigate the possibility of a STOL canard aircraft. It was retired after testing.

Voyager

Rutan was approached by his brother Dick about designing an airplane that could fly nonstop, unrefueled around the world, something that had never been done before. Around-the-world flights had been accomplished by military crews using in-flight refueling.

Rutan developed a twin-engined (piston engines, one pusher and one tractor) canard-configured design, the Rutan model 76 Voyager. The pusher engine would run continuously; the tractor engine would be used for take-off and the initial climb to altitude, then would be stopped.

The aircraft was first flown with two Lycoming O-235 engines. After development work, it was reengined with a Continental O-200 (modified to include liquid cooling) as the pusher engine and a Continental O-240 as the tractor engine.

As a proving flight, Dick and his partner Jeana Yeager made a record setting endurance flight off the coast of California. In December 1986, they took off from Edwards Air Force Base in California and flew around the world (westward) in nine days, fulfilling the aircraft's design goals. The Voyager was retired and now has the honor of hanging in the ''Milestones of Flight'' exhibit in the National Air and Space Museum (NASM) main exhibit hall, with the Wright ''Flyer'', ''Spirit of St. Louis'' and Bell X-1.

Solitaire

The Sailplane Homebuilders Association (Now the Experimental Soaring Association) opened a competition for a homebuilt, self-launching sailplane. Rutan designed the model 77 Solitaire for this competition, which it won. The sailplane was canard-configured, with a retractable engine ahead of the cockpit.

Catbird

Desiring a new personal airplane, Rutan designed a five-seat, single-engined pressurized airplane, the Model 81 Catbird. The airplane was configured as a three-surface aircraft (canard, main wing, and tail). After serving as Rutan's personal airplane, it was retired. The Catbird is notable for winning the CAFE Challenge aircraft efficiency prize in 1993.

Lotus Microlight

Rutan was approached by Colin Chapman, the founder of Lotus Racing, to design a single-seat ultralight aircraft. Again, a canard configuration was developed, the Rutan model 91. Colin Chapman's untimely death brought this project to an end, after the aircraft had flown.

Pond Racer

Concerned about the dwindling numbers of World War II aircraft, with many being consumed by use as Unlimited Class racers at the Reno Air Races, Bob Pond contracted Scaled to design an Unlimited Class racer. The result was the Pond Racer. After design studies, a twin-engined, conventional configured layout was chosen. The aircraft was powered by two 1000 hp Electromotive-Nissan VG-30 3-liter GTP piston engines running on methanol. The aircraft was built and tested before delivery to the customer. It appeared at the Reno Air Races in 1991, 1992 and 1993. The aircraft was destroyed in a forced landing crash on September 14, 1993, killing pilot Rick Brickert.

Boomerang

A departure from the canard design was the Rutan Boomerang perhaps one of the unconventional designer's most unconventional aircraft. The aircraft, the model 202 Boomerang, is an asymmetric twin-engine tractor configuration aircraft with one engine on the fuselage and another mounted on a pod. A November 1996 ''Popular Mechanics'' feature article said it "looks more like a trimotor that lost its right boom and engine".

Proteus

The Model 281 Proteus is a tandem-wing high-endurance aircraft designed by Burt Rutan to investigate the use of aircraft as high altitude telecommunications relays. The aircraft's requirements were designed by Angel Technologies and Broadband.com. Its first flights were in 1998. It holds several altitude records, set in 2000.

Spacecraft

Rutan made headlines again in 2004 with SpaceShipOne, which, in June of that year, became the first privately built, flown, and funded manned craft to reach space. On October 4, a few months later, SpaceShipOne won the Ansari X Prize, completing two flights within two weeks, flying with the equivalent weight of 3 persons, and doing so while reusing at least 80% of the vehicle hardware. The project team was honored with the 2004 Collier Trophy, awarded by the National Aeronautic Association for "greatest achievement in aeronautics or astronautics in America." The craft embodies Rutan's unique style, and is another of the "icons of flight" displayed in the NASM ''Milestones of Flight'' exhibit.

This achievement was quickly commercialized – Virgin Galactic, an offshoot of Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Group, announced that it would begin space tourism flights in 2008 using craft based on the designs of SpaceShipOne. Dubbed SpaceShipTwo, these new craft, also designed by Burt Rutan, are intended to allow six "experience optimized" passengers to glimpse the planet from 70–80 miles up in suborbital space. Production of the first of five planned SpaceShipTwo craft has started, with the first test flights currently scheduled for 2007-8. An explosion at the Scaled Composite factory at the Mojave Spaceport on July 26, 2007, killed three engineers and seriously injured three others. They were testing components for SpaceShipTwo, but Scaled Composites remained dedicated to perfecting the design of SpaceShipTwo.

Burt Rutan is also working with t/Space in the development of an air launched, two-stage-to-orbit, manned spacecraft. It is intended to have a taxi capacity to carry passengers to the International Space Station. In June 2005, air drop tests of quarter scale mockups verified the practicality of air release and rotation to vertical.

White Knight Two

Richard Branson, on July 28, 2008, unveiled Scaled Composites White Knight Two "Eve," at the Mojave Spaceport. Flight tests were set to begin in September 2008. The launch customer of White Knight Two is Virgin Galactic, which will have the first 2 units, and exclusive rights to the craft for the first few years. Branson prophesy the maiden space voyage will take place in 18 months: "It represents... the chance for our ever-growing group of future astronauts and other scientists to see our world in a completely new light." Virgin Galactic contracted aerospace designer Burt Rutan to build the mothership and spacecraft.

GlobalFlyer

On March 3, 2005, the Virgin Atlantic GlobalFlyer, an aircraft similar to the Voyager design, but built by Rutan's new company Scaled Composites, with stiffer materials and a single jet engine, completed the first solo non-stop, non-refueled flight around the world with adventurer Steve Fossett as pilot. Reducing weight was critical to the design, and Rutan is quoted as facetiously telling his staff that when they finish building a part, they must throw it up in the air for a weight test, and "If it comes down, it's too heavy". Between February 7, 2006 – February 11, 2006, Fossett and the GlobalFlyer set a record for the longest flight in history: 41,467.53 km (26,389 miles), the third absolute world record set with this aircraft before being flown to the NASM Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center. Global Flyer is the sixth vehicle designed by Burt Rutan in the NASM collection.

Hybrid Flying Car

Rutan's final design, model 367, is a hybrid flying car. Announced in July 2011, the twin-pod vehicle has a wingspan of 31 feet 10 inches; with the wings reconfigured, the car has a width of 7 feet 11 inches and fits in a single-car garage. The design has two 450 cc four-cycle engines, one in each pod, which power a pair of generators that in turn power the electric motors used for propulsion. "Lithium-ion batteries in the nose of each pod will provide power during take off and an emergency backup for landing. With a cruising speed of , Scaled Composites says the BiPod 367 would have a range of ." The plane can fly at which reduces the range to . "Out on the road, this roadable aircraft, which carries of fuel, is expected to have a driving range of 820 miles. It has a claimed electric-only range of 35 miles."

Climate change

On July 29, 2009, Burt Rutan drew a full house for his presentation at the Experimental Aircraft Association's EAA Airventure 2009 Oshkosh Conference entitled "Non-Aerospace Research Quests of a Designer/Flight Test Engineer" where he discussed his thoughts on his hobby of climate change. Although he admitted in his presentation that he was not a climate scientist, he stated he spent most of his career on data analysis and interpretation and how it is used or misused.

"I put myself in the (Those who fear expansion of Government control) group, and do not hide the fact that I have a clear bias on [ Anthropogenic global warming (AGW)]. My bias is based on fear of Government expansion and the observation of AGW data presentation fraud - not based on financial or any other personal benefit. I merely have found that the closer you look at the data and alarmists’ presentations, the more fraud you find and the less you think there is an AGW problem... For decades, as a professional experimental test engineer, I have analyzed experimental data and watched others massage and present data. I became a cynic; My conclusion – “if someone is aggressively selling a technical product whose merits are dependent on complex experimental data, he is likely lying”. That is true whether the product is an airplane or a Carbon Credit."

He describes his interest on the climate change topic as deriving from his "interest in technology, not tree hugging". Burt Rutan's house was featured in a November 1, 1989 article in ''Popular Science'' entitled: "21st Century Pyramid: The Ultimate Energy-efficient House".

Rutan will also not interview with Scientific American, as he claimed that the magazine has "...improperly covered man-made global warming. They drink Kool-Aid instead of doing research. They parrot stuff from the IPCC and Al Gore."

Retirement

On November 3, 2010, Scaled Composites announced the retirement of Burt Rutan:

"Burt Rutan, founder of aerospace research firm Scaled Composites in 1982, has announced his plans to retire in April 2011. He currently serves as Scaled’s Chief Technical Officer and following his retirement, Burt will assume the title of founder and chairman emeritus.

Burt has worked in California's Antelope Valley for more than 45 years, initially as Flight Test Project Engineer for the Air Force and in 1974 he founded the Rutan Aircraft Factory to develop experimental aircraft for homebuilders.

“Burt is known worldwide as a legendary genius in aircraft design in the aviation world. I am very fortunate and proud to have worked by his side for the past 28 years,” says President Douglas B. Shane. “We wish Burt and his wife, Tonya, the very best the future holds for them.”

On April 1, 2011, Rutan retired from Scaled Composites to his home in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. He said that he is working on one more innovative design. In July 2011, this was revealed to be a hybrid flying car, the Model 367 BiPod.

References

External links

The Ultimate Online Resource on Every Known Rutan Project

Chrysler Design Award webpage

Online biography

Biography from House Committee on Science

Video of Burt Rutan at the TED Conference discussing NASA and space entrepreneurs. (Recorded February 2006 in Monterey, CA. Duration: 20 mins)

SpaceShip One

Category:1943 births Category:American aerospace engineers Category:American aviators Category:Aviation inventors Category:Living people Category:People from Clackamas County, Oregon Category:Collier Trophy recipients Category:Aviation pioneers Category:California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo alumni Category:People from Dinuba, California Category:Presidential Citizens Medal recipients Category:National Academy of Sciences laureates

de:Burt Rutan es:Burt Rutan eo:Burt Rutan fa:برت روتان fr:Burt Rutan it:Burt Rutan he:ברט רוטאן ja:バート・ルータン pl:Burt Rutan pt:Burt Rutan ru:Рутан, Бёрт fi:Burt Rutan sv:Burt Rutan zh:伯特·鲁坦