Wednesday January 3, 1894

It was found that the foreman’s Coat & Waistcoat had been taken from the New Buildings during the night. The police investigated the matter & were inclined not to think the act one of burglary.

H.H. Turner, Chief Assistant

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Rebekah Higgitt says.....
Buildings, and the presence of contractors, was a near-constant feature of life at the Observatory in the 1890s.

Wednesday January 3, 1894

M^r Ellis came up & handed over his keys

William Christie, Astronomer Royal

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Rebekah Higgitt says.....

William Ellis's retirement is formalised with a hand-over of the precious keys that gave Royal Observatory staff access to the buildings and through the gates of Greenwich Park.

Tuesday January 2, 1894

In the evening severe weather, with snow set in. The Astrophotographic Dome was left open by the observer, & on the next morning the telescope & inside of dome were covered with snow, which however had not melted.

H.H. Turner, Chief Assistant

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Rebekah Higgitt says.......

Bad weather - a perennial problem for astronomers! This image just misses the astrographic dome, which was built above the building off the right (west). It does, however, show the large dome covering the 28-inch telescope with the smaller dome that housed the Sheepshanks telescope in front.

Tuesday January 2, 1894

Went to M^r Turner’s dinner to M^r & M^rs Ellis

William Chrisite, Astronomer Royal

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Rebekah Higgitt says.....

The Astronomer Royal attended a dinner hosted by his Chief Assistant, Herbert Turner, for the recently-retired William Ellis. Ellis (1828–1916), had first come to the Observatory as a computer aged 13 and, with the exception of a period in 1852-53 stayed there his entire working life. Turner was also about to leave Greenwich.

Monday January 1, 1894

M^r W. E. Plummer came to the Observatory to make observations for Personal Equation in connection with the determination of the longitude of the Liverpool Observatory.

H.H. Turner, Chief Assistant

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Rebekah Higgitt said...
New Year's Day at the Observatory and it's business as usual, with the Chief Assistant hosting the director of a provincial observatory. Finding the exact longitude of Liverpool in order to aid accurate navigation and time determination was the main purposes of Liverpool's Observatory. This work was, therefore, fundamental to the core remit of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, which was founded to aid navigation by mapping the stars in order to find a means of calculating longitude at sea.

Diarist 3: Frank Dyson

Frank Watson Dyson (1868-1939) was educated at the University of Cambridge and was successively Christie's Chief Assistant (1894-1905), Astronomer Royal for Scotland (1905-1910) and Astronomer Royal (1910-1930).

Diarist 2: H.H. Turner

Herbert Hall Turner (1861-1930) was educated at the University of Cambridge and was Christie's Chief Assistant at Greenwich (1881-1894) before being appointed as Savilian Professor of Astronomy and Director of the Radcliffe Observatory at Oxford.

Diarist 1: William Christie

William Henry Mahony Christie (1845-1922) was educated at the University of Cambridge and was Chief Assistant to George Biddell Airy from 1871 to 1881. He succeeded Airy as Astronomer Royal, a post which he held until 1910.