The Illustrated Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time

224 Pages·2003·54.46 MB·English

by  Dava Sobel

The Illustrated
Longitude

The Illustrated
Longitude
DAVA SOBEL
AND
WILLIAM J. H. ANDREWES
Walker & Company C»l New York
For my mother,
Betty Gruher Sobel,
a four-,)tar navigator
who can jail by the heaveiu
but always Driven by way of Canard ie
-D.S.
For my parents,
John and Pol Andrews,
my haven throughout the voyage
- W. A.
Text copyright © Dava Sobel 1995
Introduction copyright© Dava Sobel 1998
Illustration captions and supplementary text copyright © William J. H. Andrewes 1998
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any
means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage
and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the Publisher.
First published in the United States of America in 1998 by
Walker Publishing Company, Inc.; first paperback edition published in 2003
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Sobel, Dava.
The illustrated longitude/Dava Sobel and William J. H. Andrewes.
p. cm.
Originally published: Longitude. New York: Walker, 1995.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-8027-1344-0
1. Longitude—Measurement —History. 2. Chronometers — History.
3. Harrison, John, 1693—1776. 4. Clock and watch makers — Great
Britain — Biography. I. Sobel, Dava. Longitude. II. Andrewes,
William J. H., 1950- III. Title.
QB225.S63 1998
526'.62'09-dc21 98-19858
ISBN 0-8027-7593-4 (paperback) CIP
Book design by Robert Updegraff
Color separations by Rapida Group, pic, London, England
Printed in Italy by LEGO, Vicenza
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 21
Acknowledgments vi
Introduction vn
1. Imaginary Lines 1
2. The Sea Before Time 15
3. Adrift in a Clockwork Universe 27
4. Time in a Bottle 43
5. Powder of Sympathy 51
6. The Prize 63
7. Cogmaker's Journal 75
8. The Grasshopper Goes to Sea 93
9. Hands on Heaven's Clock 107
10. The Diamond Timekeeper 121
11. Trial by Fire and Water 137
12. A Tale of Two Portraits 151
13. The Second Voyage of Captain James Cook 165
\4. The Mass Production of Genius 179
15. In the Meridian Courtyard 197
Illustration sources and credits 211
Bibliography 214
Index 215
Acknowledgments
The authors offer their special thanks to Catherine Andrewes, Jonathan Betts, Michael Carlisle, Bruce Chandler, George
Gibson, Owen Gingerich, Derek Howse, Andrew King, David Landes, Peggy Liversidge, David Penney, and Martha
Richardson for their useful comments to the text and captions.
The following individuals have contributed in many other important ways:
Diane Ackerman; Pippa Andrewes; Art Resource, New York: Leiden: Peter de Clercq, Robert van Gent; National
Alison Gallup; Ashmolean Museum, Oxford: Anne Steinberg; Association of Watch and Clock Collectors, Columbia, Pa.:
Ellen Bruce Atkins; David Axelrod; Rear-Admiral Francois Beth Bisbano, Eileen Doudna, Kathy Everett; National
Bellec; Mario Biagioli; Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, Maritime Museum: Maria Blyzinski, Gloria Clifton, Kristen
Florence: Carla Giuducci Bonanni; Bibliotheque Nationale de Lippincott, Lindsey Macfarlane, Richard Ormond, Colin
France, Paris: Mane-Therese Gousset; Bodleian Library, Starkey, David Taylor; National Portrait Gallery: Bernard
Oxford; The Boston Athenaeum: Catherine Cooper, Richard Horrocks, Jill Springall; Nederlands Scheepvaartmuseum:
Wendorf; Bridgeman Art Library, London & New York: Diederik Wildeman, Willem Morzer Bruyns; Observatoire
Lesley Black, Adrian Gibbs, Alice Whitehead; British Library, de Paris: J. Alexandre, Suzanne Debarbat; Offentliche
London: Nicola Beech, Gwen Gittings; The British Museum, Kunstsammlung Basel, Kunstmuseum: Charlotte Gutzwiller;
London: David Thompson; Martin Burgess; Cambridge Ole Roemer Museum, Denmark: Claus Thykier; Mariana
University Library, Royal Greenwich Observatory Archives: Oiler; Patent Office, London; The Pepys Library, Magdalene
D.J. Hall, Ruth Long, Adam J. Perkins; Catherine Cardinal; College, Cambridge: Aude Fitzsimons; Steve Pitkin; Fred
Christ's Hospital, Horsham: Dot Mariner, N.M. Plumley; Powell; Anthony G. Randall; Royal Collection Enterprises:
Collection of Historical Scientific Instruments, Harvard Sarah Blake, Shruti Patel, Nicole Tetzner; P. J. Rogers;
University; Conservatoire National des Arts et Metiers, Paris: Royal Society: Sandra Gumming, Samantha Eley; Amanda
Frederique Desvergnes, Nathalie Naudi; George Daniels; Sobel; Stephen Sobel; Science Museum, London: Kevin
Fiftieth Space Wing Public Affairs, Falcon Air Force Base, Johnson, Alan Morton; Science Museum/Science and
Colorado: Bill Bollwerk, Mary Hinson, Steve Hutsell; Fourth Society Picture Library, London: Venita Paul; Alan Neale
Estate: Victoria Barnsley, Graham Cook, Paul Forty, Victoria Stimson; Jan Tadrup; Norman J. W. Thrower; The Time
Heyworth-Dunne, Christopher Potter; Charles Frodsham & Museum, Rockford, Illinois: Patricia Atwood, Seth Atwood,
Co., London: Richard Stenning, Philip Whyte; Gottingen Ann Shallcross, John Shallcross; Trinity College, Cambridge:
University Library (Staatsarchiv Hannover); John Griffiths; Alison Sprospon; A. J. Turner; United Technologies
Harvard Law School Library: David Warrington; Harvard Corporation: Marie Dalton-Meyer, Lawrence Gavrich;
Magazine: John Bethell, Janet Hawkins, Jean Martin, University Library, Leiden, Department of Western
Christopher Reed; Harvard Map Collection: David Cobb, Manuscripts: R. Breugelmans; Robert Updegraff; Usher-
Joseph Garver, Arlene Olivero; Harvard University Art Gallery, Lincoln: Judith Robinson, Richard Wood; U.S.
Museums: Marie Clare Altenhofen, Mariorie Cohn, Elizabeth Naval Observatory, Washington, D.C.: Geoff Chester,
Gombosi, Elizabeth Mitchell; Anders Hedberg; Houghton Stephen Dick; Burton Van Deusen; Albert Van Helden;
Library, Harvard University: Anne Anninger, Tom Ford, Robert Vessot; Walker and Company: Vicki Haire, Ivy
Roger Stoddard; Huygensmuseum Hofwijck, The Hamlin, Marlene Tungseth; Jeffrey L. Ward Graphic
Netherlands: Maria Arts Vehmeyer; Istituto e Museo di Design: Jeffrey Ward; Widener Library Imaging Services,
Storia della Scienza, Florence: Mara Miniati, Franca Harvard University: Stephen Sylvester, Robert Zinck;
Principe; Isaac Klein; Zoe Klein; Ladygate Antiques, William Andrews Clark Memorial Library, UCLA: John
Beverly, U.K.: Lew and Pat Goodman; Heather Lees; John Bidwell; Worshipful Company of Clockmakers: Christopher
H. Leopold; Michael S. Mahoney; Tony Mercer; Musee de la Clarke, Sir George White; Yale Center for British Art:
Marine, Paris: Delphine Allannic; Museum Boerhaave, Marilyn Hunt, Maria Rossi; The Earl of Yarborough
In the exciting years since the publication o$Longitude, many thoughtful readers have commented—while others
complained — about the lack of pictures or diagrams to vivify the story. Therefore I am delighted now to introduce
this handsome new illustrated volume and to welcome my good friend William J. H. Andrewes as its coauthor.
Will and I met each other over an exhibit of astrolabes at Chicago's Adler Planetarium in February 1992, but
the subject soon turned to longitude. Will, as curator of Harvard University's Collection of Historical Scientific
Instruments, invited me, a science writer, to report on the Longitude Symposium he planned to host nearly two
years later in Cambridge, Massachusetts. I hoped to attend the three-day event and write an article about it for a
popular magazine. Editors I approached at numerous periodicals, however, expressed the unanimous sentiment
that the concept was esoteric in the extreme, and none could imagine who would want to read about it. After
months of unsuccessful petitioning, I finally found a home for my idea at Harvard Magazine just a few days before
the symposium started.
I arrived on campus to discover some five hundred participants, many of them members of the National
Association of Watch and Clock Collectors, observing the tercentenary of a relatively uncelebrated English genius
named John Harrison, who, by the mid-1700s, had almost single-handedly solved the age-old longitude problem
by perfecting the art of portable precision timekeeping. Will, long a champion of Harrison's, had looked after the
clocks at the Old Royal Observatory and the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, England, where
Harrison's treasures are exhibited, and had restored to working order an early wooden clock that Harrison never
finished. In addition to the three-century travelogue of slides shown during the symposium lectures, along with
colorful animated videos of Harrison's mechanisms, Will's conference included a viewing of important clocks from
the Harvard collection. He thoughtfully extracted the interiors from most of these instruments so that their ornate
wood and metal cases stood empty beside their revealed works.
From our experiences at the Longitude Symposium, Will and I each created a book. His, The Que^t for Longitude,
featured the full formal proceedings of all the sessions, annotated and illustrated in wonderful detail. Mine, shorter
and smaller in scope, focused on Harrison's struggle with the intractable problem and the even more intractable
authorities dead set against him. In the following pages of our joint venture, the original Longitude text unfolds among
180 images of characters, events, instruments (especially Harrison's contrivances), maps, and publications that
illuminate the narrative. These pictures, paired with Will's detailed captions, offer up their own version of a
swashbuckling scientific adventure in the context of history and technology.
— DAVA SOBEL