Tribute paid as Lancaster’s ‘Bishop of the Moon’ passes away aged 77

Rev Ken Clapham, who has died aged 77, earned that title after befriending James Irwin, the American astronaut who walked on the moon in 1971 as part of the Apollo space programme and was a born-again Christian.

A helicopter brought James to visit the village school at Over Kellet, where Ken was vicar for 33 years.

Ken visited NASA, America’s National Aeronautics and Space Administration, and the Oval Office in Washington.

He flew on Concorde and took Bibles to China and Russia.

‘One of the greatest parish priests’ was how Ken was described at his funeral by Canon Peter Ballard, former Archdeacon of Lancaster.

Unusually, he also was a Methodist minister and established the Anglican-Methodist local ecumenical partnership in Over Kellet.

Born in Toxteth, Liverpool in 1947, he worked in furniture retailing and the Civil Service before being ordained at Liverpool Cathedral by Bishop David Sheppard in 1978, the same year as he married his wife Sue at Upton-on-Wirral. She survives him.

He served in Wigan and Barnsley before moving to Over Kellet in 1983.

Ken died at home on March 1 and the service and burial took place at St Cuthbert’s Church, Over Kellet, on March 15.

Methodist minister Rev Emma Holroyd also paid tribute.

Donations in his memory were given to St John’s Hospice.