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| A Dream in the Making |
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| Pages put together by Margaret (from Australia) the Curtin Clan Association's genealogist. Genealogy pages click here |
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| This web site honours Mark Shuttleworth in his quest to be in space and wishes him all the best. Mark was born in September, 1973 in Welkom, a gold-mining town in Orange Free State, South Africa. He was the first of 3 sons born into the Shuttleworth family. |
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| The family moved and was bought up in Capetown, South Africa and it was here that Mark's passion for computer games began. |
| Mark discovered the internet whilst studying for his Business Science (Finance) degree and when in his final year at Capetown University, (1996) he founded |
| Thawte Consulting, a one-man Internet consulting business. Mark began trading in internet security technologies in his parent's garage, and very quickly found success. |
| Capetown, South Africa |
| In February, 2000, Thawte was sold to Verisign, a United States Company for a huge amount of money. click here for Mark's Bio One of Mark's longtime dream's was to fly in space and he is about to fulfil this dream. |
| "I have always dreamed of space as a platform for inspiration, education and technology, and am working to realize that dream for South Africa. I hope it will inspire many of my fellow Africans of all ages to believe in the power of their dreams".....(statement from Mark Shuttleworth). Mark will fly to the International Space Station in a Russian Soyuz rocket in April, 2002. This will make Mark the first South African to fly in space, following in the footsteps of US man, Denis Tito who paid $20 million to be in space in May 2001. |
| Mark has been in training in a Soyuz Simulator and Space Adventures, Ltd. a space-tourism company have been finalising Mark's contract with the Russian Aviation and Space Agency. Mark has been in Moscow, Russia for training, and has participated in high-altitude supersonic jet flights in preparation. |
| While in space, Mark is intending to carry out a series of scientific experiments relevant to South Africa, including biomedical research on HIV/AIDS. |
| Also on Mark's intended flight will be a Russian cosmonaut, Yuri Gidzenko, and an Italian colleague, Roberto Vittori, and the mission should take about 10 days. He continues to undergo mission-specific training, and has passed the full cosmonaut board medical certificate for space flight. The equipment Mark will need for his experiements will be in the unmanned Russian freight craft which will be travelling to the International Space Station at the same time as his flight. |
| In 1822 Patrick Curtin married Margaret McCarthy, in Killavullen Parish, County Cork, Ireland and had a family. Little did he know when he walked the fields of his Beenaskehy townland family farm in Co Cork, that his great great great great grandson, Mark Shuttleworth from South Africa would be hurtling around in outer-space in 2002. |
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| Patrick Curtin fathered 6 children before he passed away in 1832. A son, named Eugene Curtin was born in 1824 most probably on a Beenaskehy townland farm. In 1854 he married Ellen Cahill and they had 5 children. Eugene's brother Patrick is pictured on my Beenaskehy link. Eugene Curtin and Ellen had a son Eugene Francis Curtin who was baptised 19 February 1863 in Killavullen parish. When aged about 22 years, young Eugene (Owen) Curtin sailed from Ireland on the "Tara" bound for Australia. He landed in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia in 1890. |
| Eugene's brothers and cousins were still farming in the area around Beenaskehy, Killavullen in the Mourneabbey area of Co. Cork, not far from the town of Mallow. In the meantime, Eugene (Owen) met and married Brisbane lady, Miss Eleanor Hayes in 1894 at St Stephen's Roman Catholic Cathedral in the city of Brisbane, Queensland. |
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| While living in Brisbane. this couple began their family of 8 children. A daughter, Eileen Mary Curtin was born in March 1898 at South Brisbane. (Eileen is the great grandmother of Mark Shuttleworth). The family moved to Melbourne, Victoria, Australia where more children were born. Eugene Francis Curtin died in Melbourne, Australia in 1932. Eileen Mary Curtin moved to South Australia, married and had 3 children there and eventually this little family group emigrated to England about 1932. She died in 1971 in Ontario, Canada. One of Eileen's daughters married Denis Shuttleworth in Egypt in 1943 and had 4 children born in England. They moved to South Africa. One of these sons, in turn, married in South Africa and is the father of Mark Shuttleworth. |
| For privacy reasons the full names of latter family generations are not noted. They all appear on a full Curtin dynasty. |
| The Curtin Clan Association was formed in the USA & registered in 1998 . It is affiliated with Clans of Ireland. We had our 1st Curtin Clan Gathering in Boston, Mass, USA in July 1999 and the 2nd Gathering in Lisdoonvarna, Co Clare, Ireland in April 2001. The 3rd Gathering is planned for 2003. The Clan plans, finances permitting, to work on getting early historical Irish data on various different Curtin dynasties published after translation from the gaelic. The genealogy side of various families is a continuing project, by Margaret, the Clan Genealogist. |
| Page made 2nd February 2002 |