Project Ozma: The Birth of Observational SETI and Drake’s Cautious Pursuit

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Project Ozma launched observational SETI in 1959 when Frank Drake quietly began a radio search for extraterrestrial civilizations, balancing scientific ambition with career risk, and the episode was later documented in scholarly memory by a 2011 publication.

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Project Ozma: The Birth of Observational SETI

It was an idea whose time had come, but nobody dared admit that out loud. Frank Drake, in particular, was keeping silent. Like many of his generation, he had long speculated about the existence of extraterrestrial life, and pondered how we humans might probe for direct evidence of our cosmic companions. Now, in 1959, the young astronomer was finally in a position to do more than ponder. At 29, he had just completed graduate school, the ink on his Harvard diploma as wet as he was behind the ears. As the new kid on the block at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory, he had access to the tools necessary to mount a credible search for radio evidence of distant technological civilizations. Drake knew enough to tread lightly; a publicly announced hunt for Little Green Men would be tantamount to professional suicide, so he approached his superior with understandable trepidation.