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Re: No Lunars Era
From: Bruce Stark
Date: 2004 Dec 6, 13:02 EST
From: Bruce Stark
Date: 2004 Dec 6, 13:02 EST
Ken,
Another thing you could have pointed out is that Lewis & Clark were by no means professional astronomers/surveyors. Lewis had had a crash course in nautical astronomy at the same time he was trying to absorb everything known about mineralogy, botany, zoology, medicine, etc. And plan and organize the trip. And party.
He was instructed to bring back accurate, legible copies of the data and let others do the calculations for correcting Clark's dead reckoning map. But both Lewis and Clark seem to have taken a real interest in nautical astronomy. The main stumbling block, in my view, was that damnable "Astronomical Notebook" Patterson laid on them. If they'd used the "Notebook" to build a fire I think they'd have done fine. They had copies of Maskelyne and Kelly with them.
Bruce
Another thing you could have pointed out is that Lewis & Clark were by no means professional astronomers/surveyors. Lewis had had a crash course in nautical astronomy at the same time he was trying to absorb everything known about mineralogy, botany, zoology, medicine, etc. And plan and organize the trip. And party.
He was instructed to bring back accurate, legible copies of the data and let others do the calculations for correcting Clark's dead reckoning map. But both Lewis and Clark seem to have taken a real interest in nautical astronomy. The main stumbling block, in my view, was that damnable "Astronomical Notebook" Patterson laid on them. If they'd used the "Notebook" to build a fire I think they'd have done fine. They had copies of Maskelyne and Kelly with them.
Bruce
