Title

Bronze statue of Alan Mathison Turing, Sackville Gardens, Gay Village Canal St, Manchester, Lancs, England, UK, M1

Caption

Turing has been honoured in various ways in Manchester, the city where he worked towards the end of his life. In 1994, a stretch of the A6010 road (the Manchester city intermediate ring road) was named "Alan Turing Way". A bridge carrying this road was widened, and carries the name Alan Turing Bridge. A statue of Turing was unveiled in Manchester on 23 June 2001 in Sackville Park, between the University of Manchester building on Whitworth Street and Canal Street. The memorial statue depicts the "father of computer science" sitting on a bench at a central position in the park. Turing is shown holding an apple. The cast bronze bench carries in relief the text 'Alan Mathison Turing 1912–1954', and the motto 'Founder of Computer Science' as it could appear if encoded by an Enigma machine: 'IEKYF ROMSI ADXUO KVKZC GUBJ'. However, the meaning of the coded message is disputed, as the 'u' in 'computer' matches up with the 'u' in 'ADXUO'. As a letter encoded by an enigma machine can not appear as itself, the actual message behind the code is uncertain.[207]
Turing memorial statue plaque in Sackville Park, Manchester

A plaque at the statue's feet reads 'Father of computer science, mathematician, logician, wartime codebreaker, victim of prejudice'. There is also a Bertrand Russell quotation: "Mathematics, rightly viewed, possesses not only truth, but supreme beauty—a beauty cold and austere, like that of sculpture." The sculptor buried his own old Amstrad computer under the plinth as a tribute to "the godfather of all modern computers" - The Alan Turing Memorial, situated in Sackville Park in Manchester, England, is in memory of Alan Turing, a pioneer of modern computing. Turing is believed to have committed suicide in 1954 two years after being convicted of gross indecency (i.e. homosexual acts). As such he is as much a gay icon as an icon of computing, and it is no coincidence that this memorial is situated near Canal Street, Manchester's gay village.

Info+

Photographe : Tony Smith

Date

Jan 11, 2019

Credit line

Photo12/Alamy/Tony Smith

Reference

LMY24T02_RFF5M4

Usage

only for France

Model release

No

Property release

No

License type

Rights managed

Available size

57,1Mb (4,9Mb) / 18,2in x 12,2in / 5472 x 3648 (300dpi)

Keywords

of prejudice lancs lancashire metal memorial richard humphry gay icon enigma alan turing statue lgbtq lgbt community gay village canal street sackville park sackville gardens sackville alan mathison turing alan mathison turing memorial manchester city centre city @hotpixuk hotpixuk gotonysmith north west england uk england canal st gay village lgbt manchester gay village lgbti community alan turing statue alan turing park cast bronze bench apple father of computer science mathematician logician wartime codebreaker victim