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Anthony Patrick Fairall

South African astronomer (1943–2008)

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 4, 2026
Entity authorityQ9156219
Source-derived summary

Anthony Patrick (Tony) Fairall (September 15, 1943 – November 22, 2008) was a South African astronomer most noted for his work on exploring the large-scale structure of the Universe, such as filaments and voids. He was the director of what is now the Iziko planetarium in Cape Town and was a well-known popularizer of astronomy in South Africa.

Fairall was born in London and moved with his family to Johannesburg, South Africa, in 1948 and then Harare, Zimbabwe in 1953. He studied at the University of Cape Town, completing his undergraduate degree in 1966. He studied for his doctorate under Gerard de Vaucouleurs and Fritz Zwicky at the University of Texas at Austin, receiving his degree in 1970.

Fairall discovered and named Fairall 9, the most luminous Seyfert 1 (active) galaxy.

Books

Fairall, A. P. (1998). Large Scale Structures in the Universe. ASIN B01K0Q41Z8.

Fairall, A. P. (2000).

Editorial summary

“Anthony Patrick Fairall” enters the record as south African astronomer (1943–2008). Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Anthony, Patrick and Fairall can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewA concise reference frame for defining the subject, testing terminology and identifying the institution closest to the evidence. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1943, 2008, 1948, 1953—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1943-09-15. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Anthony, Patrick and Fairall.
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“Anthony Patrick Fairall” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Anthony, Patrick and Fairall provides the most credible route into that argument.

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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 4, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q9156219. VIAF identifies the subject as 37203567. The Library of Congress control number is n96063613. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1943, 2008, 1948 and 1953.

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This entry incorporates text from Anthony Patrick Fairall” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.