Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time by Dava SobelMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
4.5 rounded to 5 stars - I learned so much that I didn't know about time and navigation from this short little book. In 1707 four English ships crashed and were destroyed when they went off course and ran into a rocky coast. The problem was caused by their inability to navigate by longitude. Latitude was not a problem, it had been by the stars, but longitude involved calculations of ship time against port of departure time, and needed a very accurate timepiece to do it. The British Parliament set aside a prize of 20K pounds for anyone who could solve the problem in 1714. John Harrison, a carpenter and self-taught clock maker worked for more than fifty years on this, producing better, lighter and more accurate timepieces, until he was awarded half the prize in 1765 and the other portion several years later. The book was incredibly readable and made familiar persons such as Isaac Newton, Edmund Haley, John Harrison and George III come alive.
Book 133 of 2021
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