Navigating 18th-century science: Board of Longitude archive digitised | Rebekah Higgitt

Today the complete archive of the Board of Longitude is being launched online, with stories of innovation, exploration and endeavour - and much more than just John HarrisonToday Lord Rees will be launching the digitised archive of the Board of Longitude at Cambridge University Library. Stuffed full of the correspondence and work of those who preceded him as Astronomer Royal, it also contains letters and papers of artisans, inventors, expeditionary astronomers and maritime explorers. For those not familiar with the story of the 18th-century search for a means to determine longitude at sea, this video, gives an introduction to the project and the story.The digitisation project is a collaboration between CUL and the National Maritime Museum, funded by JISC, and is closely allied to an AHRC-funded project on the history of the Board of Longitude that brings together researchers from the NMM and History and Philosophy of Science department in Cambridge.This association has meant that as well as digitising 48,596 pages from the archives and libraries at Cambridge and NMM, the content is supported by links to relevant object records at the Museum, summaries of all and transcriptions of some of the files and essays on key figures, places, institutions, objects and events. Written by the project researchers, there is enough text there for a couple of PhDs (at least) and a really useful resource for users of the site. I was the laggard who has only contributed one essay so far, on Astr...
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - Category: Science Authors: Tags: Digital media Blogposts Museums Libraries guardian.co.uk History of science Source Type: news