In Greenwich we visited the Royal Observatory, home of Greenwich Mean Time (GMT). You can see the telescope dome to the left, and the red time ball that drops at 1:00 PM each day. Major studies by the astromomers and the development of accurate clocks enabled the establishment of the longitudinal navigational lines around earth. The lines start here, at the Prime Meridian, where Sallie is standing with one foot in each hemisphere. 
By an international agreement of 1864, this is the official starting point for every new day, month and year.
The Observatory was founded by King Charles II in 1675, and the building designed by Christopher Wren. The main purpose was to improve navigation. In 1714, the British Government offered a prize of 20,000 pounds (a fortune for those days) to anyone who could come up with a solution to provide longitude to ships at sea. Because there was no way for ships to figure out where they were at sea, the nation had experienced many shipwrecks with devastating losses.
The eventual winner of the prize was John Harrison, who designed a marine chronometer that worked. We visited the Time Galleries, which feature the winning one and other tries by him and others. There are other historic timepieces and interactive explorations of time in our lives.
This is part of the reconstruction of the home of the first Royal Astronomer, John Flamstead, which was a part of the Royal Observatory. Although made a member of "The Royal Household", Mr Flamstead received only 100 pounds a year for his work and that of his wife, who served as his assistant. When he died, his wife -- not so surprisingly -- sold most of his belongings.
Here is a good website for more information about the Observatory and its museums: http://www.rog.nmm.ac.uk
On the part of the Astromer making only 100 pounds per year. I read a book fairly recently
about Alexander Selkrik; The sailor who was the model for Robinson Cruso. Which was about the same time period.
When he finally made it back to England he had over 1,000 pounds from his share of a Spanish Galleon capture.The author of the book was not sure of what that meant today.She had some Economist at Oxford help her out. It was an interesting chapter. They found that Daniel
Defoe did not make over 55 pounds per year at his peak in London. This was very much of a upper middle-class revenue. It would mean two or three full time servants, huge dinners, plays and etc.
In the Country the Selkrik estate never made over 35 pounds per year. They were kind of Country Squires at that level
Based on that 100 pounds per year seems like a pretty good wage. Maybe his wife went nuts and sold everything off similar to Mrs. Lincoln
Posted by: Pete | July 07, 2007 at 12:51 PM
The way the exchange rate is going, 100 pounds could end up being a good living again soon.
Hi Pete!
Posted by: Geoff | July 08, 2007 at 08:51 AM