North Coast Imports, Inc.

We uploaded the lecture on Longitude that was presented as part of Clocktoberfest. Here it is on YouTube!

As part of our Clocktoberfest celebration in Berea, Ohio, we are partnering with Baldwin Wallace University in presenting a special open house at the Burrell Memorial Observatory on Friday August 9, 2013 at 6:30. Dr. Edwin Meyer presents a lecture on The Marine Chronometer, The Key to Finding Longitude. The technological progress of humanity has come with a concomitant necessity for a more precise method to measure the passage of time. This was apparent when maritime travel for conquest, trade and exploration required a method to accurately determine the position of a ship at sea. A ship's latitude could be determined by the angle of the noonday sun, but the determination of a ship's longitude turned out to be the biggest technological challenge of the 18th Century. There were two paths to this achievement - navigation by the heavens and navigations by accurately measuring time. Dr. Meyer will tell the story of this race for the determination of longitude on the high s...

From ScienceDaily (Mar. 8, 2012) : A proposed new time-keeping system tied to the orbiting of a neutron around an atomic nucleus could have such unprecedented accuracy that it neither gains nor loses 1/20th of a second in 14 billion years -- the age of the Universe. New technology may produce a clock 100 times more accurate than the best current Atomic clocks. [photo: NASA]

This post is a bit late, but is interesting enough to read anyway. J. Edwards at Tick Talk gives a nice history of the tradition of dropping the ball on New Year's Eve. Here is an excerpt: Although it’s arguably the most famous of ball drops, the concept of dropping a ball from a pinnacle point in the city to mark a precise point in time isn’t a Times Square first. The practice dates back almost 100 years earlier than the first Times Square ball drop. Initially conceived by Robert Wauchope, of England, time balls were used to synchronize the deck watches and ship chronometers of Navy vessels, who depended on accurate timekeepers to help them navigate longitudinally. Learn more about methods to discover Longitude on our blog here or on our / museum website

Here's something interesting... Forget diamonds - one Swiss watchmaker is betting on watches made from moon dust, parts of the Apollo 11 rocket and bits of spacesuits to capture consumer cash as an economic slow down bites. More than 600 watchmakers have the Swiss brand stamp, so Geneva-based Romain Jerome aims to use "inaccessible materials" to set its products apart from rivals such as Richemont's Vacheron Constantin and independent watchmaker Patek Philippe. "We chose the space conquest," he said. "Going to the moon was the biggest adventure of human kind." The group will make 1969 watches - matching the year of Neil Armstrong's and Buzz Aldrin's first journey to the moon - for the "Moon Dust-DNA" collection. The watches, which start at $US15,000 and can cost as much as $US500,000, will be launched in Geneva on Wednesday and presented to customers at next year's Baselworld, the largest annual fair for the watch and jewelry ...