A History of the World - The Clock That Changed the World

Adam Hart-Davis tells the story of the amazing 280-year-old wooden clock, made in Lincolnshire, that changed timekeeping for ever and helped solve the problem of how to navigate round the world. Adam tells the amazing story of John Harrison and gets to grips with the clock in Leeds, helping to put it together and make it run. He also makes his own wooden clock to show how Harrison did it. Adam takes to the sea at Hull to show why finding your position was so difficult in the 1700s and why sailors so often got it wrong, with tragic results. He shows how Harrison changed all that, eventually designing an incredibly accurate portable watch that Captain Cook took on his second voyage. Bringing the story bang up to date, Adam shows how the idea of using time to find your position was key to Captain Cook, but is also at the heart of today's satellite navigation systems. On the way, he finds evidence of John Harrison and his brother James (also a joiner) round north Lincolnshire.