Speaker
Description
Fifty years ago local astronomer Tony Fairall initiated what was originally intended as a southern sky counterpart of the Markarian survey. Markarian's observations had led to the identification of many new Active Galactic Nuclei. One of Fairall's first discoveries was a bright nearby quasar that has become known as "Fairall 9". While most of the over 1500 sources added to the Fairall lists in the two decades thereafter proved to be unremarkable, the survey found dozens of new AGN or suspected AGN. We have re-observed a number of these with the improved spectroscopic instrumentation now in use at SAAO. These new optical spectra, photometric data and now available data in other wavelength regimes allow us to better determine the nature of the Fairall AGNs. We also assess luminosity and spectral changes that occurred in some of these objects.