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John Harrison

This person built five clocks of unparalleled sophistication over a thirty year period: H-1, H-2, H-3, H-4, and H-5. Each clock exists to this day, and the first three still run.

Nevil Maskelyne

This person was a major proponent of the lunar-distance method for determining longitude. He was obsessed with discovering a solution to the longitude problem and wrote The British Mariner's Guide.

William Harrison

This person helped to build and test H-3, H-4, and H-5.

Admiral Sir Clowdisley

This person's shipwreck motivated the passage of the 1714 Longitude Act.

Galileo/Newton/Kepler/Cassini

These people are famous astronomers who play a large role in the pre-history of this book. They not only struggle and fail to solve the problem of longitude, but they lay out the path toward a lunar-distance method that was championed by later astronomers.

John Flamsteed

This person was a British royal astronomer...

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