Radcliffe Observatory Research Articles

Two hundred years of thunderstorms in Oxford

Meteorological records commenced at the Radcliffe Observatory in Oxford in 1772. Detailed records of thunderstorm occurrence are available between 1828 and 1986; since 1986 a reliable private record of thunder frequency from Oxford has been used to extend the record to 2019, forming a record of almost 200 years of thunderstorm frequency for the city – a record probably unique anywhere in the world. This newly digitised record is examined for long-term (decadal) trends in thunderstorm frequency, and by Lamb Weather Type. Comparisons are made with other long-period records from West London, around 75km southeast of Oxford. Reasons to account for the marked reduction in thunderstorm frequency in the last decade are suggested.

Deriving “definitive” results in observational COVID‐19 research: A problematic endeavor

In this current time of 'pandemic medicine', appraising, synthesising and understanding emerging evidence from disparate groups spanning borders and methodologies can be a complicated yet crucial process in guiding clinical and public health strategy. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.

Atmospheric Electricity at Durham (27 May 2017)

Atmospheric Electricity at Durham (27 May 2017)

Literature reviews in the health professions: It's all about the theory

Medical EducationVolume 50, Issue 4 p. 380-382 Commentary Literature reviews in the health professions: It's all about the theory Geoff Wong, Corresponding Author Geoff Wong Oxford, UKCorrespondence: Geoff Wong, Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences, University of Oxford, 2nd Floor, New Radcliffe House, Radcliffe Observatory Quarter, Woodstock Road, Oxford OX2 6GG, UK. Tel: 01865 289 300; E-mail: grckwong@gmail.comSearch for more papers by this author Geoff Wong, Corresponding Author Geoff Wong Oxford, UKCorrespondence: Geoff Wong, Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences, University of Oxford, 2nd Floor, New Radcliffe House, Radcliffe Observatory Quarter, Woodstock Road, Oxford OX2 6GG, UK. Tel: 01865 289 300; E-mail: grckwong@gmail.comSearch for more papers by this author First published: 15 March 2016 https://doi.org/10.1111/medu.12964Citations: 3Read the full textAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat Citing Literature Volume50, Issue4April 2016Pages 380-382 RelatedInformation

Review: Remembering Radcliffe: 300 Years of Science and Philanthropy

Remembering Radcliffe: 300 Years of Science and Philanthropy Bodleian Library, Oxford 28 November 2014–20 March 2015 John Radcliffe (1652–1714) was a phenomenally successful Oxford-educated physician who, in the words of his acerbic contemporary Thomas Hearne, had “little learning but … a great sagacity [and] he never had his equal by which he got such a vast sum of Money.” Radcliffe left the bulk of his wealth to his alma mater with the provision that the greatest part should be spent on building a new library in central Oxford, the remainder being set aside for a new quadrangle at his old college. The largest part of the bequest, £40,000 ($62,537), led in 1737–47 to the construction of the library now known as the Radcliffe Camera. Oxford’s first hospital, the Radcliffe Infirmary, followed in 1759–67 on what was then the northern fringe of the city, and in 1773–94 the Radcliffe Observatory went up on an adjacent site. The Radcliffe Trust continues to do valuable charitable and scientific research work today, as this small but well-chosen exhibition reminded visitors, but for architectural historians its value lay in the insight it gave into the buildings that still bear the benefactor’s name. Since the days of the Egyptian pharaohs, people have tried to cheat death and oblivion by erecting massive memorial structures. Writing in 1744, Thomas Salmon …

A homogenous daily rainfall record for the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford, from the 1820s

A record of daily rainfall totals from 1827 at the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford, United Kingdom, is presented. Changing instrumentation over the period and homogenization of the record are described. Brief analysis of the record is provided, including reference to the monthly record from 1767. Most heavy falls of rain occur in summer. The twentieth century tendency toward wetter winters was not accompanied by any significant increase in heavy falls of rain. There were very few heavy falls in summer during the 1990s but a large number in autumn. Preliminary analysis suggests that there are more heavy downpours in summers when there is reduced storminess in the North Atlantic region.

Andrew David Thackeray at the Radcliffe Observatory

Though established in the nineteen-thirties, the Radcliffe Observatory in Pretoria was only able to make use of its main instrument from 1948 onwards. At the start of this period, Andrew David Thackeray was appointed Chief Assistant. In 1950 he became the Radcliffe Observer, in which post he remained until the closure of the establishment in 1974. For these twenty-four years he directed its science and was responsible for many of its most interesting achievements. In this year, the International Year of Astronomy, it is appropriate to remind ourselves of his important contributions to the field.

A contribution to meteorology by Spencer Cowper, Dean of Durham 1746–74

The writer of a hitherto unnoticed letter dated 17 January 1770, which was received by the National Meteorological Library and Archive, which was received in 1935 by the National Meteorological Library from the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford, has been identified as Spencer Cowper, Dean of Durham from 1746 to 1774. In the letter Cowper summarizes the weather observations he made in Durham in 1769, provides a short but masterly analysis of the regional climate and refers to the completion of a naturalist's journal, which he planned to send to Oxford. This paper makes the case that the recipient of the letter was almost certainly Thomas Hornsby, first Radcliffe Observer, whose links with Durham are fully explored. Investigation of the context in which the letter was written reveals the hitherto neglected range and depth of Spencer Cowper's scientific interests and connections. The journal to which Cowper refers has not yet been traced despite extensive searches, but, through an examination of the development and use of naturalists' journals during the late 1760s and of the wider national and regional context of data collection and observation evident in correspondence between those involved, new light is shed on Spencer Cowper's likely awareness and associations, some of which are evident in the newly analysed catalogue of his books and scientific instruments that were offered for sale after his death.

Jeffery Burley and Kristina Plenderleith (eds), A history of the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford: a biography of a building, Oxford, Green College at the Radcliffe Observatory, 2005, pp. viii, 186, illus, £14.50, US$28.00 (hardback 0-9509394). Orders to: The Development Office, Green College at the Radcliffe Observatory, Woodstock Road, Oxford OX2 6HG; e-mail: development.office@green.ox.ac.uk

The Radcliffe Observatory has been described by some as the finest eighteenth-century building in Oxford, and by Nikolaus Pevsner as architecturally the “finest observatory in Europe”. However, there is so much more to the Radcliffe Observatory than the architecture, and this book uses multiple authors and a biographical approach to reveal a fascinating story.

David Stanley Evans FRSSAf 1916–2004

The story of the early days of the Radcliffe Observatory Pretoria, to which Dr David Stanley Evans came as second assistant in 1946, is a remarkable one. By 1935 after a legal battle with the University of Oxford lasting several years, the Radcliffe Trustees sold the old (Oxford) observatory (founded 1772) and proposed to establish outside Pretoria what would be the largest telescope in the Southern Hemisphere. They had just 65 000 pounds to cover the cost of the telescope, spectrograph and other vital equipment, an office and three houses for staff.

Cross-currents in Astronomy and Navigation: Thomas Hornsby, FRS (1733-1810)

Thomas Hornsby was a hard-working, scientifically ambitious and significant man of vision (in more senses than one) during the second half of the eighteenth century. He was a notable astronomical observer, founder of the Radcliffe Observatory at Oxford, a successful lecturer, a Commissioner of Longitude at a critical time, and editor of James Bradley's Astronomical Observations. This paper presents some long-neglected facts; in assembling scattered fragments into a coherent account, it raises new speculations.

Book reviews

Book reviewed in this article:The world of weather by Brian Cosgrove.Meteorological observations at the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford: 1815–1995 by J. G. Wallace.Weather wisdom: Proverbs, superstitions, and signs. Compiled by Stewart E. Kingsbury, Mildred E. Kingsbury and Wolfgang Mieder.Climates of the British Isles. Edited by Mike Hulme and Elaine Barrow.

Out of the meridian: John Bird's equatorial sector and the new technology of astronomical measurement

Summary When Thomas Hornsby commissioned John Bird to build a set of five major astronomical instruments for the new Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford, the order included an Equatorial Sector. This was an instrument of experimental design, intended to measure angles out of the meridian. Although in itself a transitional instrument, the Equatorial Sector's capacity for extra-meridional measurement, especially for the observation of comets, encouraged craftsmen to develop the design first into the Equatorial Circle, and then into the large equatorially mounted refracting telescope used in conjunction with micrometers. Although other Equatorial Sectors were made, Bird's instrument for Oxford is the only one that survives intact. The present study examines this unique artefact within the context of changing astronomical demands between the 1770s and the 1820s.

The Time Museum Catalogue of Chronometers by Anthony G. Randall

202 Book Reviews TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE Instruments in various institutional contexts are also treated. J. A. Bennett examines the interactions of Thomas Hornsby at the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford, with his instrument makers; Marijn van Hoorn relates the development of the instrumentation at the Teyler’s physical laboratory in Haarlem, Holland; and J. C. Deiman discusses Utrecht University’s microscopes. Several articles provide windows on the instrument-making trade. The instrument makers John Bird, George Graham, and Jesse Ramsden (among others) figure prominently in Bennett’s article. Gloria C. Clifton provides a careful social and institu­ tional analysis of the producers of optical instruments in 17th- and early18th -century London, complete with a list of all the known manufac­ turers for this period. There are also detailed examinations ofindividual instrument makers and their businesses or achievements: Hemming Andersen on the Dane Jeppe Smith, Allan Chapman on Jesse Ramsden as a figure who “scaled up” instrument making to an industrial level, and Anita McConnell on the use of Thomas Cooke’s order book to get at a social analysis of who the buyers were for optical instruments circa 1860. Making instruments count, in the history of technology or in the history of science, is no easy matter. Still needed are more catalogs, more photographs and other illustrations, and more examples of promising kinds of historical analysis. This book makes repeated pleas for all of these and provides some promising models to be emulated. Historians of technology and science, with a little reflection, will be able to see many opportunities to extend this example. Moreover, what differences might be found in investigations of instruments and instru­ ment making in parts of Europe beyond Britain and the north, or in America, or in Asia? While some literature exists for these parts of the world, they are not represented in this volume. Gregory A. Good Dr. Good is associate professor of the history of science at West Virginia University. He researches the history of the sciences of the earth and the instrumentation of these sciences. The Time Museum Catalogue of Chronometers. By Anthony G. Randall. Rockford, Ill.: Time Museum, 1992. Pp. x+366; illustrations, glossary, bibliography, index. $139.00 +handling. The story of the establishment of practical ways of finding longitude at sea should be one of the most fruitful of case studies for historians of technology. It has everything. It was an exceptionally long process taking over 200 years even from the time when the basic methods were first clearly adumbrated in the 16th century and with a prehistory stretching back to antiquity. Those who occupied themselves with the problem were among the leading scholars and craftsmen of their day, TECHNOLOGYAND CULTURE Book Reviews 203 and the story is one in which members of both groups were researching at the technical and scientific frontiers of the acquisition of new knowledge, new skills, and new methods. The subject offers massive materials for renewing the scholar/craftsman debate. At the same time, research into the subject was heavily influenced by economic and social imperatives, while the ways in which this research was modulated can be explained only in terms of patronage networks, artisan education, and the corporative structures that controlled the lives of craftsmen. Few other technological topics are so important, and even fewer offer such a clear demonstration of the cultural and social determination of technical endeavor. Nonetheless, until recently the subject has remained almost exclu­ sively the preserve of internalist historians primarily concerned to establish the stages of technical progress toward the fully fledged marine chronometer. This is of course the essential backbone, but the subject offers so much more that one can only welcome the present work, which, although itself primarily a technical study, explicitly recognizes the larger context, seeks avowedly to stimulate further research, and has as one main aim the giving of “life and meaning to one of the greatest, most representative collections of chronometers ever assembled” (p. vi). And this is no exaggeration. The work, written by one of the finest watchmakers practicing in the world today, is a catalog of part of the stunning collection of timepieces assembled by Seth G. Atwood and displayed at the Time Museum in...

Making Instruments Count: Essays on Historical Scientific Instruments Presented to Gerard L’Estrange Turner ed. by R. G. W. Anderson

TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE Book Reviews 201 Making Instruments Count: Essays on Historical Scientific Instruments Pre­ sented to Gerard LEstrange Turner. Edited by R. G. W. Anderson, J. A. Bennett, and W. F. Ryan. Brookfield, Vt.: Variorum (Ashgate), 1993. Pp. xix+492; illustrations, notes, index. $89.95. This book is a festschrift in honor of Gerard L’Estrange Turner, undoubtedly a most influential figure in the history of scientific instru­ ments over the last generation. This influence has been effected through twelve books, more than 100 articles, numerous biographical articles, and, less obviously, his editorship of thejournal Annals ofScience. A useful list of his publications appears in the book’s preface. The thirty-five articles in this volume cover a wide range ofissues and, predictably, vary in depth of analysis. Some provide the merest description of an instrument or a chronology of development. Others suggest entirely new questions about the use of instruments in science and their interpretation by historians or explore the dynamics of the instrument trade. The two opening essays, byJ. L. Heilbron and A. J. Turner, are among the most stimulating on broader historiographic questions. Heilbron assures us that instrument catalogs have functioned to standardize phenomena perhaps even more than the instruments themselves. More generally, he advocates historical study of the “rhetoric of scientific instruments.” Turner points out that it is important for historians to show how instruments were important to the science of their time and not just to assert that they were. At a deeper level, he notes the anachronism of the very term “scientific instrument.” He endorses Derek Price’s point that instruments have been used for measurement and to provide the raw material for theory construction but also for revelation and out of a “sheer love of machinery.” Turner, however, qualifies this endorsement via a long discussion of types of instruments and periods in their development. While these schema are not without objection, this essay should be required reading for anyone writing the history of instruments. Many of the articles concern some particular class of instrument or even an individual instrument: an astrolabe from Picardy, astronomical paper instruments, 18th-century chemical furnaces, or Charles Wheat­ stone’s wave machine. Some of these are most suggestive; some are not. A. D. C. Simpson’s discussion of 19th-century British pendula is a careful and detailed account that transcends the instrument itself to explore its roles in sanctioned metrology and in the study of the earth. Of special interest to historians of technology with no special penchant for scientific instruments is Willem Hackmann’s discussion and catalog of W. G. Armstrong’s hydroelectric machines, which used a steam boiler to generate static electric charges. Hackmann relates the machine to its actual contexts: the popular interest in electricity in early Victorian Britain and the relations of science to light industry. Moreover, he provides period illustrations and photographs of surviving machines. 202 Book Reviews TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE Instruments in various institutional contexts are also treated. J. A. Bennett examines the interactions of Thomas Hornsby at the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford, with his instrument makers; Marijn van Hoorn relates the development of the instrumentation at the Teyler’s physical laboratory in Haarlem, Holland; and J. C. Deiman discusses Utrecht University’s microscopes. Several articles provide windows on the instrument-making trade. The instrument makers John Bird, George Graham, and Jesse Ramsden (among others) figure prominently in Bennett’s article. Gloria C. Clifton provides a careful social and institu­ tional analysis of the producers of optical instruments in 17th- and early18th -century London, complete with a list of all the known manufac­ turers for this period. There are also detailed examinations ofindividual instrument makers and their businesses or achievements: Hemming Andersen on the Dane Jeppe Smith, Allan Chapman on Jesse Ramsden as a figure who “scaled up” instrument making to an industrial level, and Anita McConnell on the use of Thomas Cooke’s order book to get at a social analysis of who the buyers were for optical instruments circa 1860. Making instruments count, in the history of technology or in the history of science, is no easy matter. Still needed are more catalogs, more photographs and other illustrations, and more...

‘Dismal Johnny’: A Companion of Newman Recalled

Among the companions of John Henry Newman at Littlemore at the time of his reception into communion with Rome in October 1845, perhaps the least remembered is John Walker. Indeed, Ambrose St. John, Richard Stanton, and Bernard Dalgairns followed Newman to the Oratory, yet Walker could never bring himself to do likewise. Often confused with Canon John Walker of Scarborough (one of Newman’s subsequent theological correspondents), ‘Dismal Johnny’, as he was dubbed by Manuel Johnson, the Radcliffe Observer, enjoyed a less than happy relationship with Newman. To recall the life of Walker is to shed some further light upon Newman’s own character, and to witness a reconciliation of estranged companions in old age.

Myasthenia gravis. (Clinical Neurology and Neurosurgery Monographs, Volume 5), by Hans J. G. H. Oosterhuis. New York: Churchill Livingstone, 1984. $45.00

Journal of Neuroscience ResearchVolume 13, Issue 3 p. 464-465 Book Review Myasthenia gravis. (Clinical Neurology and Neurosurgery Monographs, Volume 5), by Hans J. G. H. Oosterhuis. New York: Churchill Livingstone, 1984. $45.00 Sir John Walton, Sir John Walton Warden Green College, at the Radcliffe Observatory Oxford, EnglandSearch for more papers by this author Sir John Walton, Sir John Walton Warden Green College, at the Radcliffe Observatory Oxford, EnglandSearch for more papers by this author First published: 1985 https://doi.org/10.1002/jnr.490130314AboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat No abstract is available for this article. Volume13, Issue31985Pages 464-465 RelatedInformation

FURTHER SPECTROSCOPIC OBSERVATIONS OF GG CAR.

ABSTRACT Spectrograms of GG Car were made at the Bosque Alegre Astrophysical Station of the Cordoba Observatory, Argentina in 1950 and 1951 with a dispersion of 42 A/mm; at the Radcliffe Observatory, South Africa in 1953-56 with dispersions of 29.6 A and 49.3 A/mm at H-gamma, and at the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory, Chile in 1968-70, 1976 and 1979. Radial velocities of the P Cygni H absorptions were plotted, distribution versus time, and a 31-day period was established for the binary system. The component that is behind at eclipse is surrounded by an expanding, thick, extended envelope that does not permit observation of the lines arising in the stellar photosphere. The thick envelope is expanding with a velocity of 140 km/sec, with forbidden Fe II forming in a lower density level. It is speculated that the weak H emission originates from an envelope that surrounds the whole system.

An Abundance Analysis of Fehrenbach’s Star (HD 116745) in Omega Centauri

AbstractHD 116745 is an eleventh magnitude early F-type giant occurring in the field of the globular cluster ω Cen. Membership in the cluster appears virtually certain since the star’s radial velocity differs insignificantly from the mean cluster velocity of +238 km s-1. HD 116745 lies nearly 4 mag. above the horizontal branch in the HR diagram and is presumably in a rapid, advanced stage of evolution. Spectrograms at 22.5 Å mm-1 and 155 Å mm-1 have been obtained by one of us (R.J.D.) at the Radcliffe Observatory in South Africa using a McGee spectracon image tube. The lower dispersion spectra have been used to measure Hy profiles and the Balmer discontinuity, and one high dispersion film has provided the basis for a differential curve-of-growth analysis with respect to the Sun in order to determine some heavy element abundances. Physical data derived for the star are Mv= –3.32, θe=0.77±0.02, logg = 1.0±0.3 and Results of the curve-of-growth analysis, in which a model atmosphere was used to determine the curve appropriate to the star, yield a logarithmic iron-to-hydrogen abundance ratio with respect to the Sun of [Fe/H]= —1.2 with a provisional estimated uncertainty of about +0.2. This result is based on 28 lines of Fe i. Ti may be marginally overabundant, with a value of [Ti/Fe] = + 0.4, based on 7 lines of Ti II. Other elements and ionization states identified are Mg I, Al I, Si I, Ca I, Sc II, VI, VII, Mn I, Sr II, Zr II (Eu II).

Narrow-Band Photometry of Red Variables in Globular Clusters

AbstractFourteen red variables in the southern globular clusters 47 Tuc, ω Cen, and NGC 362 have been observed on an eight-color system of narrow-band photometry in the near infrared. Temperatures are derived from blackbody fits to the calibrated fluxes, and spectral types are given for the M stars. The types observed for the three Mira variables in 47 Tuc range from M3.1 to M7.5; two small-range variables in the same cluster are later than M4. The variables in ω Cen are mostly earlier than K5, but spectra of types M3 and MO were also encountered among radial-velocity members. In both the metal-rich 47 Tuc and the metal-poor ω Cen, the relation between TiO band strength and temperature is approximately normal. Several of these stars fall well above or below the red giant branches of their clusters in diagrams of infrared magnitude against temperature. Comparisons are made with recent results obtained at Radcliffe Observatory on some of the same stars.