Greenwich: A Time and a Place Trivia Quiz

Answer: Greenwich Mean Time

Initially GMT was used for maritime purposes. The problem of longitude, vital for navigation across the world's oceans, was dependent on a fixed reference point by which navigators could calculate their east-west position on the waves. GMT was originally measured by calculations of the position of certain bright stars in the night sky (known as the clock stars) from the Greenwich Observatory. This was the means to measure time until well into the twentieth century when atomic clocks took over.

Before the adoption of GMT, there was no standard for time across the UK, let alone the world. For example, if you were at the top of Ben Nevis in Scotland at one o'clock London time, it would be twenty minutes to one where you stood. This hadn't been a problem until the industrial age came along and a national transport network and telegraph system was built. The need for standardised time for the creation of train timetables became pressing. In the early days of the trains, the passenger would need to change their watch upon arrival at their destination in the same way that plane passengers have to when flying between countries.

In the middle of the nineteenth century, the railway companies adopted Greenwich time as the only time on which their trains ran. Whilst this was initially regarded with suspicion and sometimes hostility outside of London, by 1855 ninety-eight per cent of public clocks were displaying GMT. This became possible with the invention of telegraph wires which could transmit the correct Greenwich time from an electronic master clock in the Royal Observatory. Prior to this time, the Observatory provided a service whereby a time courier would visit all the clockmakers in London each day so that they could synchronise their clocks.

GMT was officially made UK time by an act of Parliament in 1880. Whilst GMT is still referred to in times throughout the world, since 1972 time had been measured not in Greenwich but in Paris at the BIH (Bureau International de l'Heure). There measurements are taken from 38 atomic clocks around the world to establish a mean time known as UTC (Universal Time Co-ordinated) which is a more accurate measurement of the same time as GMT.

Answer: John Flamsteed

King Charles II, an enthusiastic supporter of scientific investigation, created the post of Astronomer Royal in March 1675. John Flamsteed, already a very well-regarded astronomer, was appointed to the role with an annual stipend of £100. Sir Christopher Wren suggested that Greenwich Park might be an appropriate area in which to build the Royal Observatory from where Flamsteed could do his work, as it was far enough from London to escape its pollution whilst still being easily accessible from there. Charles II provided a warrant handing the land, which was already in royal possession, over to Wren to develop.

Flamsteed laid the first stone of the building that was to become Flamsteed House on 10 August that year after establishing by horoscope that this was the most favourable date to begin construction. The placing of two highly accurate clocks in the Octagon room in Flamsteed House, from where Flamsteed began his observations of the positions of the stars, established Greenwich Mean Time and enabled Flamsteed to demonstrate that the earth revolved at a constant rate.

Whilst Flamsteed had decreed the most propitious date to start building he soon discovered that it was not in the ideal position. The building had been built over the foundations of a previous building on the site, Duke Humphrey's Tower, and did not follow the north-south meridian. Therefore Flamsteed built himself a shed at the bottom of the garden which did follow the meridian and set up his instruments there instead. He continued to make his observations from this shed for forty-three years until his death.

Flamsteed has a considerable legacy that he left the astronomical world; he was the first astronomer to record a sighting of Uranus (even though he mistook it for a star), and his naming convention for stars, the Flamsteed designations, was the popular means by which stars were referred to for more than two centuries until Bayer designations become the standard, with some stars still being known by the numbers he gave to them.

Sadly the meridian that Flamsteed's shed established failed to last beyond his years. The walls of his shed began to subside so Flamsteed's successor, Edmund Halley, built a new observation room and established his own prime meridian. Halley's successor, James Bradley, also built his own new observation room which again established a new prime meridian, but this one lasted - it is the one that the Ordnance Survey still uses for its maps. However it was the Greenwich meridian established by the seventh Astronomer Royal, George Airy, set some six metres to the east of Bradley's meridian that was adopted as the Universal Prime Meridian by the International Meridian Conference in 1884.

Answer: John Harrison

The British government established the Longitude Act in 1714, offering a maximum prize of £20,000 (several millions in today's currency) to anyone who could establish an improved method of measuring longitude at any location in the world. The method would need to be accurate to within half a degree of longitude to be considered for the prize.

Several different ideas for how to measure longitude, from observation of the eclipses of Jupiter's moons to the stationing of signal ships along established trade routes were suggested as possibilities but the one reliable method that kept being returned to was the clock solution. If each ship had on board two clocks, one set to the time of the home port and one that would be set to noon each day when the sun was directly overhead where the ship was, then the difference in time between the two clocks would establish the vessel's east-west position.

So far, straightforward. The problem was that no clock existed that could withstand the journey across oceans and still keep time accurately. John Harrison, a clockmaker from Yorkshire, believed that he could solve the problem. After meeting Astronomer Royal, Edmund Halley, he was provided with funds to build his first attempt at the marine chronometer, H1. It was a clock that impressed the scientific community but not Harrison himself, so he petitioned the Board of Longitude to provide him the funds to build another, H2. However, he soon realised his blueprint for H2 was flawed so he abandoned it and began on H3.

After nineteen years of almost constant work on H3, Harrison realised that his approach the whole time had been wrong; H3 and its two predecessors were too large and cumbersome for traveling on the seas. What was needed was a much smaller timepiece; a large watch. This large watch was to become H4, made from Harrison's designs by London clockmaker John Jeffreys; the solution to the longitude problem.

H4 was put to sea; its first sea voyage proved a failure but it was given a second chance in 1763 and this time performed three times better than the requirements for the prize. However, Harrison was not given the credit as the new Astronomer Royal, Nevil Maskelyne believed that the "lunar distances" method, based on his own "Nautical Almanac", was the correct solution to the problem and he wanted history to remember him as the discoverer of the solution, not Harrison. Maskelyne's place on the Board of Longitude meant that Harrison's achievements were discounted.

After several years of argument with the Board and parliament, Harrison built H5, a copy of H4, and presented it to King George III. The king tested the device over a number of weeks and declared to the Board that it met the necessary requirements to claim the prize. Harrison was eventually paid just over £23,000 for his designs in 1773.

The story of John Harrison is told extensively in the award-winning book "Longitude" by Dava Sobel.

Answer: Henry VIII

Whilst there had been prior royal links to Greenwich, the manor of Greenwich began to take on its royal lustre when it passed into the ownership of Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester in 1417. Humphrey, the brother of Henry V and uncle and regent to Henry VI, enclosed 200 acres of land that ultimately became Greenwich Park and built himself a riverside home, called Bella Court. However, by the time of its completion in 1447, Henry VI had come of age and Humphrey found himself very much out of favour; to the extent that he was imprisoned on a charge of high treason and found dead in his cell the next day.

Bella Court was taken over that year by Margaret of Anjou, the wife of Henry VI, and renamed as the Palace of Pleasaunce. After the Battle of Bosworth Field brought an end of the Plantaganet line of kings, Henry VII demolished Pleasaunce and had it rebuilt on a grander scale to make it fit to be the royal court. He named the new palace, Placentia.

On 28 June 1491 Henry VIII became the first of three Tudor monarchs to be born in the Palace of Placentia. His first two surviving children, the future queens Mary I and Elizabeth I were also born at the Palace but by the time of the birth of the future king Edward VI, Henry VIII had moved the royal court to Hampton. The Palace however, was still popular with the Tudors despite the move and Elizabeth used it as her principal summer residence.

The Palace fell into disuse once the Tudors had been succeeded by the House of Stuart. It was demolished on the orders of King Charles II in 1660 who wished to rebuild it again. However, the project stalled and the site eventually became home to the Royal Naval Hospital.

Answer: Fire from overheated equipment

On the morning of Monday 21st May 2007, those of us lucky enough to have views over Greenwich woke to see smoke rising above the river. An intensive investigation into the cause showed that a high-powered vacuum cleaner, which had been left on over the weekend by conservation workers, had overheated and caught alight, setting fire to the ship's timbers in the process. The security personnel guarding the ship were also heavily criticised for failing to do their proper checks, allowing the fire to take hold when it could have easily been prevented from spreading.

Fortunately, at the time of the fire, much of the ship's timber work had been taken away from the site for preservation work meaning that the damage to the ship, whilst still significant, was far less catastrophic than it could otherwise have been.

Answer: Sir Francis Chichester

Sir Francis Chichester set off from Plymouth in his 54-foot ketch on 27 August 1966 with the intention of completing his circumnavigation in a time that bettered those of the wool clipper ships that sailed from Australia to the UK; an average of 123 days per trip. In order to set such a fast time, Chichester grew mustard and cress on board to ward off scurvy and to allow him to sail non-stop to Sydney. By achieving this Chichester set a new record for the longest single journey by a small yacht without a port of call. Despite several difficulties along the way include damage to the boat's steering, Chichester made the journey in 107 days.

After some repair work in Sydney, Chichester set off for home, again without stopping. The circumnavigation was completed with Chichester's return to Plymouth harbour on 28 May 1967; a total trip of 226 sailing days which was a record time for a circumnavigation by a small vessel. Shortly afterwards he sailed up the Thames to Greenwich to be received by Queen Elizabeth II who knighted him in the main square at the Royal Naval College with the same sword that Elizabeth I had used to knight Sir Francis Drake in 1581.

Gyspy Moth IV was placed into dry dock alongside the Cutty Sark after Chichester's death in 1972 without ever having sailed since its famous journey. It remained in dock as a visitor attraction until 2004 when, for the price of one pound and a gin and tonic, it was bought by the UK Sailing Academy and restored to full seaworthiness in preparation for another round the world journey in 2005.

Answer: Sir Christopher Wren

The Hospital was built on the site of the Palace of Placentia, the birthplace of King Henry VIII and two of his children. The palace had fallen into disuse and disrepair by the seventeenth century and initially the architect John Webb was commissioned by King Charles II to build a new palace on the site. However by the time of Charles' death, the project had ground to a halt. It was Queen Mary II who in 1694 called upon Wren to adapt the work begun by Webb to a completely new project, that of the Royal Naval Hospital, an almshouse for former seaman who were fallen on hard times.

Wren, by this time in his mid-sixties, took the commission without pay to "have a share in a work of mercy" and the buildings proved to be his architectural swansong, being the only one of his projects still under construction after St Paul's Cathedral was completed in 1711. The unusual design of the buildings, with several blocks of buildings separated by a large courtyard was Wren's second design for the site; the first had been rejected by the Queen as she wished for the view of the river from the Queen's House, built by Inigo Jones some 200 metres to the south of the Palace of Placentia, to be maintained.

Though Wren was the principal architect of the new buildings, the project was highly collaborative. Wren's assistant, Nicholas Hawksmoor, had a hand in the design and the slow build of the site meant that the buildings were not completed until long after Wren's death. In the mid-eighteenth century, another great English architect, Sir John Vanbrugh was brought in to oversee its completion.

The buildings were declared part of the Maritime Greenwich UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1997.

Answer: Admiral Horatio Nelson

Nelson was killed in October 1805 at the Battle of Trafalgar but not before commanding the British fleet to their most notable naval victory of the Napoleonic wars. Nelson was felled by a sniper's bullet as he stood on the deck of his ship, HMS Victory.

Nelson's body was placed in a cask of brandy to which was added camphor and myrrh in order to preserve the body. On arrival back in Britain, the Victory travelled up the Thames to Greenwich where Nelson was placed on display in the Painted Hall of the Royal Naval Hospital for his lying-in-state.

As a town with a strong naval tradition, it was appropriate that Britain's greatest naval hero should be taken to Greenwich, but it wasn't fully prepared for the thousands that came to visit. At the time, the population of Greenwich was just 14,000 but each day of the lying-in-state, more than 20,000 visitors came to pay their respects to the nation's hero. Huge traffic jams to and from London formed and thousands had to be turned away from the Naval College because there wasn't enough room.

On 8th January 1806, Nelson's body was removed from the Painted Hall and taken to the river, flanked by five hundred naval veterans. He was placed on the Victory's barge and a crew of forty-six, followed by a flotilla a mile long, rowed his body up river to St Paul's Cathedral where Nelson was laid to rest.

Answer: Canaletto

Canaletto, full name Giovanni Antonio Canal, began his career assisting his father, a theatrical scene painter, in his home town of Venice. His work took him to Rome, where he began to draw pictures of modern buildings and ancient monuments. On returning to Venice his experiences in Rome led him to decide to concentrate on painting the city in a topographical manner rather than continue his work with his father.

His earliest works were intimate portraits of unremarkable parts of the city which are considered amongst his finest, but he soon moved on to painting grander portraits of the more famous areas of the city. It was these portraits that brought him acclaim as they proved popular with visitors to Venice, particularly Britons undertaking the Grand Tour.

Unrest in Austria beginning in 1740 led to a reduction in the number of visitors to Venice and therefore a reduction in the business in Canaletto's paintings so, on the apparent suggestion of fellow Venetian painter Jacopo Amigoni, he moved to London in 1746. Though his work in London is not considered to be his finest (indeed some critics suggested that the poorer quality indicated that the Canaletto in London was an imposter) but they nevertheless include some of the best portraits of 18th century London.

"Greenwich Hospital from the North Bank of the Thames" was painted in around 1752, possibly commissioned by the British Consul to Venice, and also Canaletto's agent, Joseph Smith. The view matches that of the view from Island Gardens although it is considered doubtful that Canaletto ever visited the site. The painting can now be seen in the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich.

Answer: A dome

The idea for a commemorative exhibition at the end of millennium was first devised by the John Major government in 1994. The idea was initially to have a Festival of Britain style event paid for by private finance. However, the government found it difficult to find backers and eventually decided that the state would provide the funding. After a protracted bid, the symbolic significance of Greenwich with regard to time won the vote over its rivals.

A brownfield site (land previously used by heavy industry) on the North Greenwich peninsula was chosen. After considerable time spent decontaminating the site, construction of the dome and its supporting buildings began in June 1997. Designed by Richard Rogers, the dome (which is technically speaking not a dome at all as it has no base) consisted of a vast canopy punctured by twelve equally vast yellow pylons which act as support to the domed roof.

The figures involved with the construction of the dome tell the story of the scope of the project. Close to 44 miles of cabling were used to connect the ninety metre pylons to the domed roof to hold it in place; one million square feet of roof panelling were used; the structure covers twenty acres, thirteen times the size of the Albert Hall and at the time of construction it was the largest domed building in the world. Even the crane needed for its construction required a fleet of twenty-four lorries to transport it to the site. Along with the infrastructure required to deal with the expected number of visitors, including Europe's largest underground station at North Greenwich, the total cost of the project came to £789 million.

After all the construction came the vital question of what to put in it. The floor space was divided into 14 zones plus a central performance area. Each of the zones covered a topic that fell into one of three categories; "Who we are", "What we do" and "Where we live". Most of the zones were sponsored by leading UK companies such as Boots (Body Zone), BT (Talk Zone) and Ford UK (Journey Zone). The exhibition (and the building itself) came in for considerable criticism in the British media, particularly due to the large amount of public money put towards it, but more than six million visitors came through its doors in the course of the year.