A DUKINFIELD native can be forgiven for feeling out of this world after being honoured with a CBE for his services to NASA.
Then again, Anthony Freeman should be used to fame as his auntie is none other than Audrey Marsden, who hit the headlines by becoming a mascot for Mossley AFC at the age of 85!
After working in the US space agency’s jet propulsion laboratory, he received his accolade in the King’s New Year’s list for services to UK/US Relations in space and earth Science.
His current home of Cambria, California – which he describes as ‘a small seaside town surrounded by vineyards and cattle ranches’ – may seem a world away from his home.
And let’s face it, the famed Highway One, which passes nearby, is a much more suitable location for him to be driving his 1965 British Racing Green MGB.
But home is truly where his heart is and memories of growing up in Dukinfield, after living in Mossley – where he still has family – when he was very young, remain vivid.
Former St John’s Primary School pupil Dr Freeman, who grew up on Lodge Lane then Astley Street after turning 10, recalled: “I remember my favourite teacher, Miss Adshead from St John’s.
“The warm brick outside the school boilerhouse on a cold winter’s day and chasing a dog around the cemetery that had stolen a hat from outside the school office with the headmaster.
“I also recall buying fireworks from the local newsagents Mr and Mrs Lowry as Bonfire Night approached and my mum getting us dressed up to do the Whit Walks.
“There’s also discos at the Town Hall, chips and gravy to eat now from the chippy on King Street, getting beaten up by a roaming gang from Stalybridge in Duky Park and my first pint in The Newboro inn.
“This is an incredible honour, capping off what has been a very satisfying and rewarding career at the frontiers of space and earth science.
“I guess you could say it’s what I dreamt of as a youngster, devouring every science fiction book I could get my hands on in Dukinfield Library on Town Lane.”
Dr Freeman’s connections with Dukinfield remain. His visits his father, who still lives on Astley Street, a couple of times a year and his younger brothers live nearby – one in Dukinfield and one in Ashton-under-Lyne.
His met his best friends, Jeff and Kev, at St. Johns. They keep in touch almost every day and are getting together in February.
But how does a lad from Dukinfield end up getting a CBE after working for NASA’s jet propulsion laboratory, living in Cambria, California – where he and Glossop-born wife of 45 years Phyllis moved to after he retired?
Dukinfield can officially call itself the home of one of the inventors of the field of radar remote sensing and the mentor to ‘many very bright people.’
Among his career highlights, the Ashton-born scientist adds: “The exciting new space mission projects we initiated, the armada of game-changing CubeSat/SmallSat space missions I championed and the selection of the VERITAS Discovery mission to Venus.”
Well, after St John’s, it was on to Stockport Grammar School, to which he recalls jumping on the open back of the moving 330 bus, then Tameside College, where he met Phyllis.
After studying Mathematics at UMIST for his degree, he stayed there to do a Ph.D. in Astrophysics.
Dr Freeman told The Correspondent: “My first ‘real’ job after graduating was working at the GEC-Marconi Research Centre in Chelmsford on radar satellites.
“At the first conference I presented at, someone in the audience offered me a job at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory to work on the radar they were building to fly on the space shuttle Endeavour.
“The rest is history.”