Kinns, Roger (Author)
The time ball service at Port Louis, Mauritius started in April 1833, six months before the Greenwich service. It was established by John Augustus Lloyd who had been appointed Surveyor-General and Civil Engineer in 1831. He was a man of energy and initiative who soon developed a well-equipped observatory and a time service. His chosen arrangement, described in a presentation by Sir John Herschel in London during 1836, was unlike the design for Greenwich. It used a stationary black ball on a white background behind a shutter whose complete closure, not the moment of release, signalled the exact time. Lloyd departed Mauritius in 1849, leaving a legacy of engineering and astronomical achievements. There is some evidence that a conventional time ball had been erected on the roof of the old observatory, possibly for experimental purposes. The time service appears to have deteriorated through the 1850s and 1860s, with only an intermittent flag signal for an extended period, although a new time ball had been erected high on Signal Mountain in 1866. It was rejuvenated when the Royal Alfred Observatory became operational in 1874. Lists of time signals from 1880 onwards include a large black ball on Signal Mountain. A smaller white ball with a larger drop height was introduced as the new principal signal near the Port Office in March 1907. Both time balls appeared in some international lists up to 1945, but publications in Mauritius have indicated much earlier withdrawal of the time ball on Signal Mountain.
...More
Article
Kinns, Roger;
(2011)
The Hobart Time Ball and Time Gun: A Critical Review
(/isis/citation/CBB001221516/)
Article
Julien Gressot;
Romain Jeanneret;
(2022)
Determining the right time, or the establishment of a culture of astronomical precision at Neuchâtel Observatory in the mid-19th century
(/isis/citation/CBB589620307/)
Article
Clare M. Brown;
(2020)
Harry Pasley Higginson and his role in the re-discovery of the dodo (Raphus cucullatus)
(/isis/citation/CBB218493185/)
Article
Martin Mahony;
(2018)
The ‘genie of the Storm’: Cyclonic Reasoning and the Spaces of Weather Observation in the Southern Indian Ocean, 1851–1925
(/isis/citation/CBB495526025/)
Book
Nam, Moon-Hyon;
(1995)
HanKuk-ui Mul-sigye
(/isis/citation/CBB000203127/)
Article
Roger Kinns;
(2019)
The 1833 time ball at Port Louis, Mauritius: the forgotten service for chronometer calibration
(/isis/citation/CBB318620976/)
Article
Kenworthy, Joan M.;
(2013)
Albert Walter, O.B.E. (1877--1972): Meteorologist in the Colonial Service. Part I: His Early Life and Work in Mauritius
(/isis/citation/CBB001321073/)
Article
Robert M. Rouphail;
(2019)
Cyclonic Ecology: Sugar, Cyclone Science, and the Limits of Empire in Mauritius and the Indian Ocean World, 1870s–1930s
(/isis/citation/CBB782813382/)
Book
Bartky, Ian R.;
(2000)
Selling the true time: Nineteenth-century timekeeping in America
(/isis/citation/CBB000111807/)
Article
Roger Kinns;
(2021)
Time signals for mariners in South Africa
(/isis/citation/CBB995065632/)
Chapter
HASHIMOTO Takehiko;
(2020)
Tanaka Hisashige and His Myriad Year Clock: Its Technological Characteristics and Historical Background
(/isis/citation/CBB545251054/)
Article
LaRue, Budd J.;
(1986)
The importation of microscopical sundials by James W. Queen and Co. in 1880
(/isis/citation/CBB000064917/)
Article
Roger Kinns;
(2020)
Time signals for mariners in India, Burma, and Ceylon
(/isis/citation/CBB015970455/)
Thesis
Kate E. Wersan;
(2019)
Between the Calendar and the Clock, an Environmental History of American Timekeeping in the Nineteenth Century
(/isis/citation/CBB715387504/)
Article
De Fazio, Thomas L.;
(1977)
Notes on the Bliss and Creighton chronometer patent
(/isis/citation/CBB000000741/)
Book
Barak, On;
(2013)
On Time: Technology and Temporality in Modern Egypt
(/isis/citation/CBB001450221/)
Book
Glasmeier, Amy K.;
(2000)
Manufacturing Time: Global Competition in the Watch Industry, 1795-2000
(/isis/citation/CBB000111233/)
Article
Roger Kinns;
(2021)
Time signals for mariners in the Atlantic Islands and West Africa
(/isis/citation/CBB357424333/)
Article
Bartky, Ian R.;
Dick, Steven J.;
(1981)
The first time balls
(/isis/citation/CBB000022982/)
Article
Schmidgen, Henning;
(2005)
Physics, Ballistics, and Psychology: A History of the Chronoscope in/as Context, 1845--1890
(/isis/citation/CBB000630273/)
Be the first to comment!