NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
From: Frank Reed
Date: 2015 Nov 16, 09:21 -0800
Here's an example of the title of an old publication that can lead to the confusion I described a couple of days ago: "The prediction and reduction of occultations: supplement to the Nautical Almanac for 1938". But this is not the Nautical Almanac in the modern sense (nor even in the original sense). The Nautical Almanac in the period from about 1875 to 1960 was the astronomers' reference intended for serious observatory work, not for navigation and not nautical, especially after about 1920. See my earlier post with more details.
In case anyone's curious how occultations were used by astronomers in the 1930s, the description below may be interesting. Another description of this supplement notes that it included descriptions and a photo of an analog computer built for accurate calculation of occultation times. Sounds fun! But not for navigation...
Frank Reed
