Who’s who Dikran Tahta 1928 2006 Stephen was inspired by Dikran Tahta his math teacher at St Alban’s school Tahta encouraged his students to think creatively about their subject and take part in lively discussions He later became a mathematics teacher at Exeter University in England A family of thinkers Stephen had two younger sisters Mary and Philippa and an adopted brother named Edward Frank and Isobel gave their children plenty of freedom The house was full of books and the family talked freely about all kinds of subjects Other people thought the Hawkings were a little strange They went on vacations in a brightly painted wooden trailer pulled by a horse and once drove to India in an old car As a child Stephen loved making things When Frank made Mary a dollhouse Stephen put in plumbing and lighting As he later explained he had a passion to understand how things worked from toy trains to the universe Young Stephen often gazed at the sky for hours At the age of 11 he passed an exam that allowed him to go to a special secondary school and he then started as a student at St Alban’s school near London
A teenage scientist As a teenager Stephen’s interest in science grew and he filled his bedroom with metal and wire gadgets He wasn’t interested in rock and roll music like many other young people Instead he and his friends enjoyed reading making complicated board games going on long bike rides and attending classical music concerts This photo shows Stephen enjoying boating in the 1950s a hobby he would later take up at college
While Stephen was studying for his A levels exams that British students take at 18 in math physics and chemistry he built two computers from scratch with his friends using clock parts and parts from a telephone switchboard They called it the Logical Uniselector Computing Engine LUCE It solved logical problems if this condition is true then another thing will happen Years later the school’s computing teacher found a box of junk and threw it away He had no idea it held Hawking’s computer This is an early computer the operating console is in the middle and the tubes containing the memory are right behind it
Science student When he was 17 Stephen took some tough exams and was accepted at Oxford University to study science focusing on physics At the time he found physics boring because it was so simple for him but he felt that physics and astronomy offered the hope of understanding where we came from and why we are here COMPUTERS In the 1950s just a few computers existed in universities for scientific research They were huge sometimes taking up an entire room A small group of trained experts used them for complicated math problems No ordinary person could operate a computer you needed to be able to write computer programs Off to college In 1959 Stephen began his studies at Oxford University He found the classes easy so he was rather lazy He later figured out that he had spent an average of one hour a day studying during his three-year program He made the most of Oxford's social life though acting as the coxswain the person who steers the boat for a rowing team The boat club enjoyed lively parties too
