{"product_id":"9781872868400-longitude","title":"Longitude","description":"\u003cmeta content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\" http-equiv=\"Content-Type\"\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003eThe Play - Based on the Book \"Longitude\" by Dava Sobel\u003cbr\u003eBased on the book \"Longitude\" by Dava Sobel, this is a play about 18th-century carpenter and clockmaker John Harrison. He was the inventor of the marine chronometer as a solution to the difficulty of accurately measuring longitude at sea, which had cost thousands of sailors their lives.\u003cbr\u003eBy 1714 the inability to measure longitude accurately at sea had led to the tragic loss of hundreds of trading ships, and thousands of lives. Pressure from merchants and seamen finally drove the government to form the Board of Longitude, and a prize of 20,000 was offered for a successful solution. Although scientists such as Sir Isaac Newton knew that a clock would solve the problem of identifying longitude, it was generally considered impossible to build one that would withstand the motion of a ship or the extremes of temperature in foreign climes. Only Harrison, an uneducated carpenter from Lincolnshire, dared to pit his genius against the establishment belief that the answer lay in the stars, pursuing the realisation of his invention against years of scepticism.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Rarewaves","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":55324283797878,"sku":"9781872868400","price":8.65,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0092\/7504\/8033\/files\/stand_13495962_30437_20250507073905.jpg?v=1746651101","url":"https:\/\/www.rarewaves.com\/products\/9781872868400-longitude","provider":"Rarewaves.com","version":"1.0","type":"link"}