Oct 19, 1995 longitude is a sheer delight of a popular history of technology. John harrison arrived in london, looking for both support and the rewards promised by the 1714 longitude act. The longitude act was an act of parliament that offered money in return for the solution to the problem of finding a ships precise longitude. Jul 22, 2019 longitude is the dramatic human story of an epic scientific quest and of harrisons fortyyear obsession with building his perfect timekeeper, known today as the chronometer. The book was published in multiple languages including english, consists of 192 pages and is available in hardcover format. Kate readings narration is accurate and clear, and lends itself well to the story. It is also a captivating brief history of astronomy, navigation. The illustrated longitude is the history of how clocks and watches developed, how our concepts of time changed, how britannia came to rule the waves, and how one determined human being altered the course of history. Michael sims is the author of darwins orchestra henry holt. Even as their seapower waned, portugals prime meridian was the worlds standard until the english achieved became the dominate sea power in the world and cracked the longitude. Full of heroism and chicanery, brilliance and the absurd, it is also a fascinating brief history. Even as their seapower waned, portugals prime meridian was the worlds standard until the english achieved became the dominate sea power in the world and cracked the longitude problem. The book has been awarded with royal society science book prize nominee for general prize 1997, and many others.
Longitude, by american writer dava sobel, is the true story of the quest to devise a reliable navigational instrument for sailors. Although the longitude problem baffled the great minds of the day, a selftaught clockmaker named john harrison found a solution. This explains how john harrison, discovered how to determine. The true story of a lone genius who solved the greatest scientific problem of his time 10th anniversary ed by sobel, dava isbn. Stern latitude and longitude any location on earth is described by two numbersits latitude and its longitude. Youll find fascinating works on the origins of chinese, greek, and japanese mathematics. Full of heroism and chicanery, it is also a fascinating brief history. Finding latitude is easy, simply take the angle between the horizon of the sun at noon or polaris at night, adjust for the date, and you know where.
With jeremy irons, anna chancellor, emma kay, samuel west. Jun 14, 2014 all history books should be so engaging my paternal line scottish greatgreatgrandfather, william brydone jack, was a pioneer in longitude in during the victorian era, helping determine the first precise longitude in canada using the telegraph with a fellow scientist at harvard, so when i saw this book pop up at bookbub, i knew i had to check it out. Breezily written and full of fascinating characters and facts, heres a science book as enjoyable as any novel. The true story of a lone genius who solved the greatest scientific problem of his time, dava sobel writes that the trick for remembering the difference is that the latitude lines, the parallels, really do stay parallel to each other as they girdle the globe in a series of concentric circles that. Featured texts all books all texts latest this just in smithsonian libraries fedlink us genealogy lincoln collection.
The measurement of longitude is important to both cartography and navigation, in particular to provide safe ocean navigation. Longitude is a dramatic human story of an epic scientific quest and harrisons fortyyear obsession with building his perfect timekeeper, known today as the chronometer. Full of heroism and chicanery, brilliance and the absurd, it is also a fascinating brief history of astronomy, navigation, and clockmaking. The true story of a lone genius who solved the greatest scientific problem of his time is a bestselling book by dava sobel about john harrison, an 18thcentury clockmaker who created the first clock chronometer sufficiently accurate to be used to determine longitude at seaan important development in navigation. Longitude is the dramatic human story of an epic scientific quest, and of harrisons fortyyear obsession with building his perfect timekeeper, known today as the chronometer. The true story of a lone genius who solved the greatest scientific problem of his time is a bestselling book by dava sobel about john harrison, an 18thcentury clockmaker who. Longitude from dava sobel is a fascinating account of how a virtually unknown watchmaker named john harrison conquered one of the oldest and thorniest problems surrounding the ocean voyages the problem of accurately measuring longitude, which stumped even the best of scientific minds for centuries. Based on the bestselling book longitude by dava sobel, the program tells the story of how an unknown genius, john. The book was made into a television series entitled longitude. Dava sobel without the ability to measure longitude the great age of exploration was marked by the number of sailors lost at sea as soon as they lost sight of land. Numerous attentive readers took the trouble to write to me to point out typos or other errors in the text, which the publisher then corrected in subsequent editions. The 10th anniversary edition of this classic book has now been released with a new foreword by neil armstrong. The starshaped map measures just fivebythree inches and shows the.
She described the life of john harrison who discovered how to. The longitude act was an act of parliament that offered money in return for the solution to the problem of finding a ships precise longitude at sea. Numerous attentive readers took the trouble to write to me to point out typos or other errors in. Sobel tells his story and the larger history of the search for longitude clearly, entertainingly, and with a fine sense of the era in which it took place. Longitude is a great retelling of a carefully researched niche in the history of mans quest for technological achievement while galileos story much like nabokovs is the retelling a story from different point of view. Anyone alive in the eighteenth century would have known that the long. The biggest peril to ships for most of history the new york times. The true story of a lone genius who solved the greatest scientific problem of his time is a bestselling book by dava sobel about. Up until the 18th century, half of navigation was done by chance. A book full of gems for anyone interested in history, geography, astronomy. The true story of a lone genius who solved the greatest scientific problem of his time. The true story of a lone genius who solved the greatest scientific problem of his time is a bestselling book by dava sobel about john harrison.
The true story of a lone genius who solved the greatest scientific problem of his time, dava sobel writes that the trick for remembering the difference is. The history of longitude is a record of the effort, by astronomers, cartographers and navigators over several centuries, to discover a means of determining longitude. The true story of a lone genius who solved the greatest. The publication of longitude taught me that a book can actually improve by virtue of being read. Sobel has done the impossible and made horology sexy no mean feat new scientist anyone alive in the 18th century would have known that the longitude. Longitude is the dramatic human story of an epic scientific quest, and of harrisons forty epubyear obsession with building his perfect timekeeper, known today as the chronometer. In this study, richard stachurski chronicles the amazing tale of discoveries made by american scientists as they worked to solve the lifethreatening quandry faced by mariners of having accurate navigational charts, and to develop a precise method of measuring longitude. If a pilot or a ships captain wants to specify position on a map, these are the coordinates they would use. To determine your exact location you also need to measure your line of longitude.
Full of heroism and chicanery, it is also a fascinating brief history of astronomy, navigation, and clockmaking, and opens a new window on our world. John harrisons h4 clock how longitude was found royal. Dava sobel dava sobel longitude harpercollins publishers longitude book pdf longitude book summary longitude e book longitude e book download longitude epub longitude pdf longitude pdf download longitude read longitude short summary longitude subject longitude. The subtitle here tells the reader exactly what the book is about. Anyone alive in the eighteenth century would have known that the longitude. The true story of a lone genius who solved the greatest scientific problem of his time by dava sobel. Longitude is the dramatic human story of an epic scientific quest and of harrisons fortyyear obsession with building his perfect timekeeper, known today as the chronometer. Great minds had tried for centuries to develop a method of determining longitude. The measurement of longitude is important both to cartography and for ocean navigation. Longitude is a book thats worth reading and rereading to learn how ideas can be turned into fact.
Z ero longitude was first located in the portuguese madeira islands and for the next 300 years the world calculated longitude from those portuguese islands. It was the greatest scientific problem of the time. In 1998, the illustrated longitude was published, supplementing the earlier text with 180 images of characters. The history in 1714 the british government threw down the gauntlet to solve the greatest scientific challenge of the century how to pinpoint a ships location at sea by knowing its longitude. An exciting scientific adventure from the days of wooden ships and iron men, longitude is full of heroism and chicanery, brilliance and the absurd. Dava sobel born june 15, 1947 is an american writer of popular expositions of scientific topics. The history of longitude is a record of the effort, by astronomers, cartographers and navigators over several centuries, to discover a means of determining longitude the measurement of longitude is important to both cartography and navigation, in particular to provide safe ocean navigation. Aug 22, 2018 historys earliest known world map was scratched on clay tablets in the ancient city of babylon sometime around 600 b. It is also a captivating brief history of astronomy, navigation and clockmaking. In two parallel stories, the clockmaker john harrison builds the marine chronometer for safe navigation at sea in the 18th century and the horologist rupert gould becomes obsessed with restoring it in the 20th century.
Oct 30, 2007 the publication of longitude taught me that a book can actually improve by virtue of being read. Longitude is a great retelling of a carefully researched niche in the history of mans quest for. The greek astronomers could measure latitude as early as the third century b. Mariners and explorers for most of history struggled to determine longitude. Longitude is a measurement of location east or west of the prime meridian at greenwich, the specially. The true story of a lone genius who solved the greatest scientific problem of his time pdf epub book. The dramatic human story of an epic scientific quest. Longitude is a superb book about the quest to solve one of the most difficult scientific challenges of the 17th and 18th centuries, and one, moreover, that caused thousands of deaths. I found it to be a very interesting book because, it is not like most history books. Longitude is the dramatic human story of an epic scientific quest, and of john harrisons fortyyear obsession with building his perfect timekeeper, known today as the chronometer. The thorniest scientific problem of the eighteenth century was how to determine. Some people have liked this book more than galileos daughter but they are really two different kinds of books. Librarything is a cataloging and social networking site for.
Enjoy a great reading experience when you buy the kindle edition of this book. Calculating longitude astro navigation demystified. The true story of a lone genius who solved the greatest scientific problem of his time is a bestselling book by dava sobel about john harrison, an 18thcentury clockmaker who created the first clock sufficiently accurate to be used to determine longitude at seaan important development in navigation. This book was written in a way that a person with no scientific. Search the history of over 424 billion web pages on the internet. Christopher lehmannhaupt, new york times a simple tale, brilliantly told. Anyone alive in the eighteenth century would have known that the longitude problem was the thorniest scientific dilemma of the day and had been for centuries. The true story of a lone genius who solved the greatest scientific. Hipparchus, a greek astronomer 190120 bc, was the first to specify location using latitude and longitude as coordinates. Explore the entire history of mathematics with our lowpriced books, each designed for years of use.
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