Ships, Clocks and Stars: the Quest for Longitude

Beautifully presented exhibition at the National Maritime Museum looking at the competition to find a solution to measuring longitude at sea.

This exhibition struck the right balance between an exhibition as an experience in itself and one presenting facts. I loved the section that looked at the discussion around the competition in a recreation of a London coffee house where the discussion would have taken place. Also a great idea to recreate the debate around which ideas to test around a board room style table with a digital top which sometimes showed maps but also showed the original documents you might have had in front of you at the meeting.

On the fact front it couldn’t be faulted either. It was a good idea to put the time approach and the stars approach to the solution up different sides of each room to give them equal weight. It is always interesting to see all of Harrison’s time pieces together. I am always amazed at the huge initial ideas then the jump down to what was basically a big watch by the end. There were good explanations of the science of each idea.

I love the fact that at the National Maritime Museum you have the real objects not just an example of something like them. I found the displays of Captain Cook and the Bounty particularly moving. Who can fail to be excited by the coconut cup used by Captain Bligh on the boat he was set adrift in. That is really like touching history! 

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