Father (of) Time

I glossed over a bit of the history of the development of Greenwich Mean Time and maritime timekeeping instruments in my account of visiting the Royal Observatory. I certainly don't want to ruin the end of the story for anybody planning to visit Greenwich (and for museum freaks, it is cool to see the early models of the maritime clocks, particularly how they were squeezed down to the size of a pocketwatch in the space of a generaton--take that, Sony!). To whet your appetite for such a visit, however, please allow me to introduce you to John Harrison.