http://www.metafilter.com/tags/isabelgill Posts tagged with 'isabelgill' at MetaFilter. Thu, 16 Sep 2004 09:10:54 -0800 Thu, 16 Sep 2004 09:10:54 -0800 en-us http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss 60 http://www.metafilter.com/35633/Isabel%2DGill%2DVictorian%2DStargazer IN 1877 Isabel Gill visited an <a href="http://www.ascension-island.gov.ac/ascension.htm">inhospitable volcanic blob</a> in the mid-Atlantic to help her <a href="http://www.bpccs.com/lcas/Articles/gill.htm">husband</a> with ground-breaking astronomical measurements. Then she wrote a wrote a<a href="http://www.bweaver.nom.sh/gill/gill.htm"> book</a> about it, including an attempt to explain to fellow Victorian ladies the concept of a solar parallax in terms she thought they might be able to grasp:<i>"I myself do not understand mathematical terms, so how could I use them with the hope of explaining these things to my readers? However, I can use knitting-needles, and perhaps they may do just as well."</i><br> Wierdly, more than a century later <a href="http://www.thomascave.com/Astronomy/Ascension/ascastronomy.htm"> another astronomer</a> visited the site and found the sandy paths which marked the Gill's lava-top camp still undisturbed by the Atlantic winds. tag:metafilter.com,2004:site.35633 Thu, 16 Sep 2004 09:10:54 -0800 ascensionisland astronomy history isabelgill science stars victorian penguin pie