Michael Perryman and Pierre Lacroûte
Michael Perryman (left) and Pierre Lacroûte (right) chat at the International Hipparcos Press Conference, 11 April 1988.
At the press conference, Reimar Lüst (ESA Director General, 1984-1990) received the Hipparcos Input Catalogue on behalf of ESA, in the presence of members of the Hipparcos science community and ESA Hipparcos team members. The Hipparcos Input Catalogue formed the mission's observing programme: it contained over 100 000 target stars that Hipparcos would monitor to obtain their astrometric properties.
Michael Perryman was the ESA Hipparcos Project Scientist from 1981 to 1997. Pierre Lacroûte was a space astrometry pioneer who first proposed a space astrometry mission in 1967; that became the Hipparcos mission.