But it was not always so! I was watching "Elizabeth: The Golden Age" last night, and I just love the part when Walter Raleigh tells the Queen of his voyages to the New World, sailing for months across the ocean, nothing else in sight, and then one day you might possibly see a faint line, a stain on the horizon. You may hope, dare to dream that you see LAND! Clive Owens' delivery is breath-taking!
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Sailors had a very difficult time finding their way across the seas, an almost impossible time not getting lost, were it not for the stars and the moon. There are no other points of reference, and so without the sextant, you were doomed. A degree wrong could have you, over the long haul, miles and miles away from your destination.
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Of course, before Harrison, there was Amerigo Vespucci and then Galileo, but they were more absorbed in theory. By the 18th Century, however, there were several tremendous disasters at sea due to errors in reckoning. One of the worst featured the loss of four ships of the British Naval fleet in 1707. Motivated by this terrible tragedy, the British goverment established a prize, through the Board of Longitude, awarded to the first person who could solve the problem!
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I have stood on that line in Greenwich, and put one foot on one side, one foot on the other. I had the world at my feet!
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