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Naval War College Review Volume 57 Article 26 Number 3 Summer/Autumn 2004 Sky and Ocean Joined: The .SU . Naval Observatory, 1830–2000, John B. Hattendorf Follow this and additional works at: https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/nwc-review Recommended Citation Hattendorf, John B. (2004) "Sky and Ocean Joined: The .SU . Naval Observatory, 1830–2000,," Naval War College Review: Vol. 57 : No. 3 , Article 26. Available at: https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/nwc-review/vol57/iss3/26 This Book Review is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at U.S. Naval War College Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Naval War College Review by an authorized editor of U.S. Naval War College Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Color profile: Disabled Composite Default screen Hattendorf: Sky and Ocean Joined: The U.S. Naval Observatory, 1830–2000, BOOK REVIEWS 171 accomplishments ranges across the administrative and bureaucratic ele- ments in its history and provides strik- Dick, Steven J. Sky and Ocean Joined: The U.S. Naval Observatory, 1830–2000. Cambridge, U.K.: ingly humanistic portraits of some of Cambridge Univ. Press, 2003. 609pp. $130 the key and colorful scientific figures that were involved, such as Maury, In this beautifully produced, albeit very Simon Newcomb, and Asaph Hall. expensive volume, Steven Dick of the U.S. Naval Observatory in Washington, The story that unfolds encompasses a D.C., has written the fascinating story range of fascinating and quite different of the origins and development of the events and details, which many readers, Navy’s and the nation’s oldest scientific whether they are general readers, naval organization. It is a fascinating and well historians, or historians of science, will written story that ranges from the es- not readily associate with the achieve- tablishment of the observatory in 1830, ments of the U.S. Navy. Chief among as part of the Navy’s Depot of Charts them are the discovery of Phobos and and Instruments under Lieutenant Deimos, the moons of the planet Mars, Louis Goldsborough, to the sixteen- and Charon, the moon of Pluto; the six- and-a-half-year tenure of the longest- teen nineteenth-century expeditions to serving superintendent, Matthew measure the transit of Venus across the Fontaine Maury, who led when it was face of the Sun; and the establishment first designated the National Observa- of the master clock of the United States. tory. The institution was originally es- In terms of practical contributions to tablished to serve the very practical fleet operations, the observatory played application of astronomy to the mea- a key role in providing the most surement of time in day-to-day naviga- up-to-date navigational technology to tion at sea. Under Charles Wilkes and ships at sea, even mass-producing chro- Maury, it quickly moved beyond this nometers during both world wars, and restricted use to extend its work to geo- providing early applications of magnetic, astronomical, and meteoro- punch-card calculating technology for logical observations that soon brought the production of an improved and it into the forefront of scientific re- more accurate American Air Almanac search, bringing global credit to the from 1941. Because the Nautical Alma- U.S. Navy and the United States. nac had one of the few scientific com- Dick, who has a degree in astrophysics, putation laboratories in the United as well as a doctorate in the history and States, its equipment was adapted in philosophy of science, tells the wide- late 1943 to do rapid calculations in ranging story of the observatory’s work spherical trigonometry to calculate the over 170 years, from the rise in the use positions of German U-boats, using in- of the chronometer in the U.S. Navy in coming intelligence and radio bearings the early nineteenth century, to its new from a hundred listening stations work in the opening of the twenty-first around the world. For this purpose, the century with the application of the sat- observatory staff used the equipment at ellite Global Positioning System. His night, when it was not being used for highly competent and very readable ex- Almanac computations, and calculated planation of the observatory’s scientific solutions to a quarter of a million Published by U.S. Naval War College Digital Commons, 2004 1 C:\WIP\NWCR\NWC Review Summer_Autumn 2004.vp Tuesday, September 28, 2004 12:26:51 PM Color profile: Disabled Composite Default screen 172 NAVAL WARNaval COLLEGE War REVIEW College Review, Vol. 57 [2004], No. 3, Art. 26 spherical triangles to locate the real- or some other civilian agency. The nat- time positions of enemy U-boats within ural administrative tensions that result five miles. from competing national security in- For those interested in the history of terests and scientific interests were Washington, D.C., the book contains a ameliorated as early as 1908 by the cre- fascinating account of the different sites ation of the Astronomical Council that of the Naval Observatory, as it moved allowed leading astronomers to have an from its first location on G Street near influence on decisions relating to the the White House, to Capitol Hill from staff’s scientific work. From 1958, with 1834 to 1842, to temporary quarters on the employment of increasingly compli- Pennsylvania Avenue near New Hamp- cated astronomical technology, the ap- shire Avenue from 1842 to 1844, on to pointment of a civilian scientific Foggy Bottom until 1893. It was then director has provided a more effective that famed architect Richard Morris means to work under the active-duty Hunt designed the buildings on Obser- naval officer who is the superintendent. vatory Hill on Massachusetts Avenue, On this point, Dick concludes that including the Superintendent’s Resi- maintaining the observatory as a scien- dence, which served from 1928 as the tific institution under Department of residence of the Chief of Naval Opera- Defense control, within the Department tions, and which in 1974 was designated of the Navy, is particularly important in as the official residence of the vice pres- regard to the observatory’s continuing ident of the United States. role in providing accurate atomic-clock time to the Global Positioning System Readers of this journal will be partic- satellites and its contributions to accu- ularly interested in the recurring rate detail on star positions and earth civilian-military controversy through orientation, critical elements to current the observatory’s history and in the ques- defense projects in space. tion as to whether the Navy should hand over administration of all or part of its JOHN B. HATTENDORF Naval War College functions to the Smithsonian Institu- tion, the National Bureau of Standards, https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/nwc-review/vol57/iss3/26 2 C:\WIP\NWCR\NWC Review Summer_Autumn 2004.vp Tuesday, September 28, 2004 12:26:51 PM.