He also encouraged the new science of radioastronomy and brought about the construction of the 210 ft radio telescope at Parkes, New South Wales. During visits to the US, he met two of his influential contacts during the war, Dr. Vannevar Bush who had become the President of the Carnegie Corporation and Dr. Alfred Loomis who was also a Trustee of the Carnegie Corporation and of the Rockefeller Foundation. He persuaded them in 1954 to fund a large radio telescope in Australia with a grant of $250,000. Bowen in return helped to establish American radio astronomy by seconding Australians to the California Institute of Technology.
