Crowded Isolation: Access, Obscurity, and the Local Contingencies of Satellite Earth Stations, 1960–2009
Alex’s project focuses on the history of British-designed satellite telecommunications infrastructure, in particular the government’s first “earth station,” established on the south coast of Cornwall in 1962. His work asks what it means for purportedly global infrastructures to be situated within communities for extended periods of time, looking at the politics of access and resources, as well as the interplay between narratives of technological progress and evolving regional identity.
The project follows the full lifespan of the earth station, which existed alongside a plethora of different priorities and concerns around land use. It also examines the transfer of this type of infrastructure across the UK, Commonwealth, and remaining Empire, before analyzing how the first maritime satellites altered relations between coastal communities and seafarers.
Building on recent “space age” histories that pay closer attention to the wide array of associated ground infrastructure that has always supported satellites and spaceflight, this dissertation shifts much of its focus away from moments of innovation and towards long-term infrastructural relations, asking what it means for spectacles of high technology to become lasting critical infrastructures.
Alex holds an MSc in Security Studies from University College London and a BA in History from the University of Exeter, where he won the dissertation prize for his research on the American space shuttle program. He has also worked as a research assistant for Exeter University’s Welcome Centre for Cultures and Environments of Health.
Publications & Presentations
Presentations
August 2024: “Imagined Atlases: Depictions of Technological Futures in Cold War America”, Slade School of Fine Art, University College London.
Image 1: View of Goonhilly Earth Station’s first aerial from inside the control tower, likely taken in 1962 (Courtesy of BT Group Archives)
Image 2: Graphic from a Royal Mail poster, depicting the Marecs A communications satellite as part of its “Safety at Sea” series of postage stamps (© Royal Mail, 1985, courtesy of The Postal Museum)