Graham was formerly Senior Education Officer at the ROG. Since his retirement he has devoted a great deal of time to researching the history of the Observatory and developing his excellent Royal Observatory and Greenwich Meridian websites. He has organised and posted a large amount of little-known material about the people at the ROG and […]
Looking around the galleries at the Royal Observatory Greenwich today, you’d be forgiven for not knowing about the work of the Magnetic and Meteorological departments in Greenwich. Understandably, the focus of the galleries is on the determination of time and the contribution of the Royal Observatory to positional astronomy in order to assist navigation. The […]
We have come to expect Eddie’s talks to be well-researched, thorough, and challenging. This talk didn’t disappoint. As Eddie said in his introduction, this was not a talk about astronomy, it was about optics, and Eddie was on home ground – much of his professional career was in the field of optics. And 2015 has […]
Brian Blake kindly arranged for us to visit the impressive Royal Astronomical Society Library where we were met by librarian Sian Prosser. Sian gave us a short introductory talk about the RAS and its activities. The RAS was founded in 1820, partly in response to the tyrannical rule of Sir Joseph Banks over the Royal […]
We were a month late for Halloween but Tony Sizer nevertheless gave us a good scare with “Ghosts, poltergeists, and the Law of Gravity”. A cynic might say astronomers are easily deceived. It seems the case that some are a bit quick to see things they want to see, especially working at the edge of […]
With the help of Bernard Bryant (Store Manager) and Louise Devoy (Curator of the ROG) we were able to take two dozen FAS members to see behind the scenes at Kidbrooke, a secure storage site not normally open to the public. Bernard greeted the group with a short history of the site (it began life […]
The mainstay of our History Group programme has been the impressive knowledge and talent of our own members. Bill’s talk added significantly to this growing tradition – Bill has special insights into the history of the telegraph network, the ‘Victorian Internet’, and he linked these to the development of Longitude determination and the ties to […]
About 30 members came along to our last History Group lecture evening of the 2013/4 season. We were treated to two talks, each by a very knowledgeable member – scholars and gentlemen both! Mesopotamian Astronomy – Tim Newling Tim Newling kicked off and spoke about ‘Mesopotamian Astronomy’. Tim is a long-standing Flamsteed member and spends […]
Roy Hookway entertained us with a splendid talk about Charles Messier. Roy has been a Flamsteed member for over 10 years, and for 13 years was Secretary of the Thurrock Astronomy Society. Roy’s interest in Messier began when he came across ‘Messier objects’ and was told only that Messier was a French bloke who found […]
The first Flamsteed History of Astronomy Group meeting of 2014 was an entertaining look at the origin of many of the constellations in the sky that we are familiar with, along with several constellations that have now been lost to the annals of astronomical history. The talk was presented by Tony Sizer. Tony is, of […]
