BIOGRAPHY

As a child, Horace Dobbs felt the call of the sea. He made his first solo attempt to cycle from his home in south London to Brighton and back in a day when he was 10 years old. He failed. He succeeded two years later, triumphantly carrying a piece of seaweed as evidence. Dr. Horace Dobbs BSc. PhD., was a pioneer of underwater research, and was founder of The Oxford Underwater Research Group in 1963. His book Camera Underwater was considered to be the definitive guide in it's day. His early career was spent primarily in medical research, and he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine, a rare honour for someone not medically qualified. An encounter with a wild dolphin in 1974 off the Isle of Man was to be the catalyst for a marked change in his life. At the time, he was engaged in clinical studies of powerful analgesic drugs, which had been synthesised in a quest for compounds that had the pain killing properties of the opiate drugs without their unwanted side effects, principally those of addiction. These compounds also had powerful psychotropic properties, and Dr. Dobbs was investigating their action on the brain. He was fascinated by how the brain works. He was also intrigued by the fact that the dolphin that had befriended him in 1974 had a brain as large and complex as that of the human. What went on inside a dolphin's brain puzzled him.

Drugs which work in humans may also be used to treat animals. A major success of his research project was the development of a drug mixture which was to prove invaluable in helping animals that had to be immobilised e.g. prior to treatment or relocation. The new combination allowed the animals to be moved without suffering the kind of trauma that had resulted in many deaths during Kariba Dam animal relocation programme in Africa. It gave Horace immense satisfaction to be able to help animals in this way. When the company eventually decided to reduce activity in the project, it was time for Horace to move on. Despite offers of employment to continue medical research, he decided that here was an ideal opportunity to dedicate some time to the study and protection of dolphins. It turned into a long time quest which was to enrich not only his own life but also the lives of many people who would come into contact with the "Dolphin Man".

Horace set up International Dolphin Watch in 1978 as a non profit organisation for the conservation and study of dolphins, especially their unique relationship with humans. One of the first people he worked closely with was the late Sir Richard Harrison FRS, Professor of Anatomy at Cambridge University, who specialised in marine mammals and had a strong interest in whales and dolphins. With the help of Professor Harrison’s personal assistant, Dennis McBrearty MA, a wall chart was produced showing the dolphins that might be sighted around the British Isles.

In 1979 International Dolphin Watch published the first edition of its Dolphin Spotters Handbook , co-authored by Dobbs, Harrison, McBrearty and Horace’s PA Elaine Orr, The Dolphin Spotters Handbook was the key publication for the DOLPHIN SURVEY PROJECT based at Cambridge University which ran for well over a decade and provided the first reliable data on the numbers and movements of different species of dolphins around the world.

Horace is now recognised world-wide as an authority on dolphins, and especially on their part in healing humans. Dr Dobbs has given presentations at schools and universities around the world. When his artist friend Richard Oldfield, alias Rico, saw Horace described as a “Scholar Gypsy” in a book review, in a newspaper, he immediately produced a cartoon.

Horace is a prolific writer and has won world-wide acclaim for his books. His voice is often heard on local and national radio. He has made many films for television,* and has appeared on the "box" on many occasions himself. He established the project Operation Sunflower in 1986 which was to be the start of an exciting programme which has contributed significantly to the acceptance of the concept of the "Healing Dolphin".

Dr Dobbs has studied eastern methods of medicine and the ancient wisdom of indigenous peoples, such as the American Indians and the Australian Aborigines, but Horace is a pioneer and is now applying the experience and knowledge he gained in orthodox medical research to explore how DAT (Dolphin Assisted Therapy) can help mentally and physically disabled children.

Books have always played an important part in Horace’s life. The books he writes are much more than methods of reporting events or recording facts. They are personal. “My books are part of me. They have each had an important role to play in the way my life has unfolded and they continue to do so. I know they have also changed the lives of many others. I like signing them for people. To me each signature is special. Through them I feel as if I am speaking to each of my readers directly”, he says.

This is apparent in his book DOLPHIN HEALING (Piatkus Book, 2000, ISBN 0 7499 2079 3) at the end of which he makes an unusual request. It is that when you have read it, you pass it on to someone else. He writes:
“It is my view that books, like dolphins, should be free. They should bear the marks of their lives: They may have words written in them by hands other than mine. They may be tear stained. They may have coffee or cough mixture spilt on them. It doesn’t matter. It adds to their character....... My request is that you now encourage it to “swim away”. Give it to a friend. Write a note and perhaps draw a picture inside the cover and put it in a school library where it can drift around, to who knows where, like a message in a bottle”.

Horace is especially good at communicating with and inspiring young people. His best selling children’s books about Dilo the dolphin have been translated into many languages including Chinese and Japanese. The Dolphin Education Research Programme (DERP) set up by International Dolphin Watch is providing scientific evidence that the power of dolphins to stimulate the human mind can be used to help children of all abilities, particularly those with special needs, to learn to read and write more quickly.

The Dolphin Dome Project which aims to simulate the life enhancing experience of encounters with dolphins using science, art and the latest technology, was the basis for a conference held at the Open University, Milton Keynes
5/6 December 2003.
View report here.

Several of Horace’s books are now out of print, but are available from public libraries who will willingly order in copies from outside sources if they do not have the titles you request in stock. Don’t hesitate to use the public library in this way. Public libraries have an important role and they need your support if they are to survive.
Second hand copies of out of print books can be obtained from sites such as www.amazonbooks.com

One of Horace’s most popular books, first published in 1990 and reprinted several times since, is Dance to a Dolphin’s Song. (Jonathan Cape, ISBN 0-224-02628-3 hardback 0-224-03076- paperback).
It tells how Horace stepped outside of the confines of his scientific training and filmed an extraordinary experiment for television. in The Dolphin’s Touch * he showed how 3 clinical depressives benefited from swimming with a wild dolphin off the Irish coast. In his book he recounts how the healing essence of dolphins has been captured with sounds and music in Dolphin Dreamtime, * which has since been shown to have widespread therapeutic uses.

Horace now has his own website at www.horacedobbs.com

* Videos and copies are available from our Dolphin Shop