Jerry Oltion

Jerry Oltion (born 1957) is an author and amateur astronomer. For Star Wars publishing, he wrote At the Crossroads: The Spacer's Tale, a short story that appeared in the 1995 anthology Tales from the Mos Eisley Cantina, published by Bantam Spectra.

He has also written various original science fiction novels and novellas, and his 1997 novella Abandon in Place won the Nebula Award for Best Novella. Oltion is additionally the author of four Star Trek novels, and he has written various other tie-in fiction under the pen name Ryan Hughes.

As an amateur astronomer, Oltion is the designer of the trackball telescope, which was featured in a 2006 issue of Sky & Telescope magazine. Oltion served as a regular columnist for the magazine from 2016 to 2025, writing about homemade astronomy equipment.

Text and facts from the “Jerry Oltion” article on Wookieepedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0. Modified for this site.