You may know that every year on New Year’s Eve, people watch a shining ball dropping down a pole in the middle of Times Square, New York, at the exact time the year changes. But do you know how this tradition relates to shipping?
The first drop
Adolph Ochs, the owner of the New York Times at the time, decided to celebrate the opening of the newspaper’s new offices in Longacre Square in 1903 with a display of fireworks on the building’s roof at midnight on December 31, 1903.
The festivities drew a sizable attendance and were quickly established as a staple for New Year’s Eve celebrations in New York. However, when fireworks were made illegal in 1907, publisher Adolph Ochs was forced to find a new tactic.
That’s when the newspaper’s head electrician, Walter F. Palmer, recommended adopting a time ball after seeing one used on the Western Union Telegraph Building near Trinity Church.
Ochs liked the idea and, as a result, a young immigrant metalworker named Jacob Starr built a time ball.
The first New York Time Ball measured 1.5 meters in diameter, weighed 318 kilos, and was made of iron and wood, with 100 25-watt light bulbs. Since then, seven different versions of the Ball have been created to herald the New Year.
Starr’s ball descended from the flagpole for the first time on the first strike midnight, and the rest is history.
The ball drop tradition became increasingly famous and has been dropped every year since then, with the exception of 1942 and 1943, when the ritual was halted owing to the wartime dimming of New York City’s lights.
New York’s time ball is the most popular today, but it’s far from the first and far from the original use. The first Time Ball was invented on the other side of the Atlantic, 89 years before New York’s, by a navy officer to accomplish exactly what its name implies: tell time.
An issue of time and longitude
Telling the time wasn’t always as easy as looking at your watch or your phone and simply reading it. Precise time telling was before the 19th century as people relied on bell chimes or public clocks, which weren’t always reliable, to tell time.
The only place where one could get accurate time was at an astronomy tower where they celestial calculations to determine it.
However, there was one set of people who need precision time telling. These individuals were none other than seamen who required precise time to establish their position.
Particularly, to determine a position on the Earth’s surface, it is necessary to know the latitude, longitude, and altitude. To find their longitude, however, they needed a time standard that would work aboard a ship.
How is longitude calculated?
- One day is 24 hours long
- As the earth is round, 360° divided with 24 hours equals 15° per hour.
Now let’s say someone sets his accurate watch to 12:00, according to Greenwich. That person travels for several hours and then notices that the sun is highest in the sky at 5:00 according to his watch.
The observer then knows he is at longitude 60° (4 hours ×15°/hour = 60°).
A maritime chronometer was specifically employed for this reason. It assisted in calculating longitude by comparing Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) and the time at the current location.
Dropping the ball across the Pond
As previously stated, accurate time is required for ships to determine their position. Even if time is accurate, there is still the issue of how individuals onboard may obtain it.
Admiral Wauchope of the British Navy set out to fix the situation. In 1818, Wauchope became interested in developing a method of communicating precise time from an observatory to ships.
He devised the “time ball” concept. The time ball was a large hollow metal sphere mounted on a pole and coupled to a device that would separate at a specified time each day, sending out a signal for mariners to set their chronometers, based on precise calculations.
His invention was tested in 1829 in Portsmouth, England, home of the Royal Naval Academy. Three years later, Greenwich got its own time ball, which was placed on top of a hill south of the Thames.
It is famous for being still in use today. Every day at 12:55, it begins its ascent halfway up its pole and continues until it reaches the summit at 12:58
Time balls became popular all across the world in the years that followed. They assisted mariners in determining their position for over a century, until radio signals became widely available in the 1920s.
If time is relevant, then so is the time ball
With advancing technology, humanity has let all its time balls fall out of use. Alas, even if the original purpose of the Time Ball fell out of use, that certain Time Ball in times square remains relevant for millions of spectators each year.
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