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Johann Caspar Horner
Johann Caspar Horner (Zürich, 12 March 1774 – Zürich, 3 November 1834) was a Swiss physicist, mathematician and astronomer. Life At the beginning he wanted to be a priest, but later he went to Göttingen, where he learnt astronomy. Then he traveled throughout the world for three years on behalf of the Russians. After the journey he took two years in Saint Petersburg with the cataloging the items he had found. He discovered a method for approaching the roots of equation with unknown factor in a higher power. His findings were published under the titles ''Über die Curven zweiten Grades'' and ''Die fünf regelmässigen Körper''. He wrote some other works also on the field of astronomy. In 1805 Johann Caspar Horner visited Japan with the Prussian Georg Heinrich von Langsdorff, as a scientist to the Krusenstern mission that also brought the Russian ambassador Nikolai Rezanov to Japan. Horner made a hot air balloon out of Japanese paper (washi), and made a demonstration in f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Washi
is traditional Japanese paper. The term is used to describe paper that uses local fiber, processed by hand and made in the traditional manner. ''Washi'' is made using fibers from the inner bark of the gampi tree, the mitsumata shrub (''Edgeworthia chrysantha''), or the paper mulberry (''kōzo'') bush. As a Japanese craft, it is registered as a UNESCO intangible cultural heritage. ''Washi'' is generally tougher than ordinary paper made from wood pulp, and is used in many traditional arts. Origami, Shodō, and Ukiyo-e were all produced using ''washi''. ''Washi'' was also used to make various everyday goods like clothes, household goods, and toys, as well as vestments and ritual objects for Shinto priests and statues of Buddha. It was even used to make wreaths that were given to winners in the 1998 Winter Paralympics. ''Washi'' is also used to repair historically valuable cultural properties, paintings, and books at museums and libraries around the world, such as the Louvre ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
18th-century Swiss Mathematicians
The 18th century lasted from January 1, 1701 ( MDCCI) to December 31, 1800 ( MDCCC). During the 18th century, elements of Enlightenment thinking culminated in the American, French, and Haitian Revolutions. During the century, slave trading and human trafficking expanded across the shores of the Atlantic, while declining in Russia, China, and Korea. Revolutions began to challenge the legitimacy of monarchical and aristocratic power structures, including the structures and beliefs that supported slavery. The Industrial Revolution began during mid-century, leading to radical changes in human society and the environment. Western historians have occasionally defined the 18th century otherwise for the purposes of their work. For example, the "short" 18th century may be defined as 1715–1789, denoting the period of time between the death of Louis XIV of France and the start of the French Revolution, with an emphasis on directly interconnected events. To historians who expand th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1834 Deaths
Events January–March * January – The Wilmington and Raleigh Railroad is chartered in Wilmington, North Carolina. * January 1 – Zollverein (Germany): Customs charges are abolished at borders within its member states. * January 3 – The government of Mexico imprisons Stephen F. Austin in Mexico City. * February 13 – Robert Owen organizes the Grand National Consolidated Trades Union in the United Kingdom. * March 6 – York, Upper Canada, is incorporated as Toronto. * March 11 – The United States Survey of the Coast is transferred to the Department of the Navy. * March 14 – John Herschel discovers the open cluster of stars now known as NGC 3603, observing from the Cape of Good Hope. * March 28 – Andrew Jackson is censured by the United States Congress (expunged in 1837). April–June * April 10 – The LaLaurie mansion in New Orleans burns, and Madame Marie Delphine LaLaurie flees to France. * April 14 – The Whig Party is officially named by ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1774 Births
Events January–March * January 21 – Mustafa III, Sultan of the Ottoman Empire, dies and is succeeded by his brother Abdul Hamid I. * January 27 ** An angry crowd in Boston, Massachusetts seizes, tars, and feathers British customs collector and Loyalist John Malcolm, for striking a boy and a shoemaker, George Hewes, with his cane. ** British industrialist John Wilkinson patents a method for boring cannon from the solid, subsequently utilised for accurate boring of steam engine cylinders. * February 3 – The Privy Council of Great Britain, as advisors to King George III, votes for the King's abolition of free land grants of North American lands. Henceforward, land is to be sold at auction to the highest bidder. * February 6 – France's Parliament votes a sentence of civil degradation, depriving Pierre Beaumarchais of all rights and duties of citizenship. * February 7 – The volunteer fire company of Trenton, New Jersey, predecessor to the paid Trenton Fire ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Christian Polak
Christian Philippe Polak (born August 1950) is a French businessman and author who has published several books on 19th-century Franco-Japanese relations; one ''Le Monde'' book review called him "the best specialist on this question". Career Born in Nogaro, Polak graduated from the Department of Japanese studies at INALCO, Paris, in 1971. The same year, he entered Waseda University's Institute of Language and Education as a foreign exchange student. In 1973, he entered the Law Department at Hitotsubashi University, and in 1980 completed his doctorate in law, writing his doctoral thesis on diplomatic relations between France and Japan from 1914 to 1925. After completing his doctoral studies, Polak attempted to obtain a position at a Japanese university, but, according to one source, the then-Japanese government "denied such a possibility to foreigners" despite various demonstrations and petitions. Polak abandoned his academic ambitions, and in 1981 founded in Tokyo the ''Sociét ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Andreas Daum
Andreas W. Daum is a German-American historian who specializes in modern German and transatlantic history, as well as the history of knowledge and global exploration. Daum received his Ph.D. summa cum laude in 1995 from the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, where he taught for six years as an assistant professor. In 1996, he joined the German Historical Institute Washington DC as a research fellow. From 2001 to 2002, Daum was a John F. Kennedy Memorial Fellow at the Center for European Studies at Harvard University. Since 2003, he has been a professor of European history at the State University of New York (SUNY) at Buffalo. He also served as an associate dean for undergraduate education in the provost's office. In 2010–11, he was a visiting scholar at the BMW Center for German and European Studies at Georgetown University. He is best known as a biographer of Alexander von Humboldt and for his studies on popular science, emigrants from Nazi Germany, and the United Stat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Montgolfier
The Montgolfier brothers – Joseph-Michel Montgolfier (; 26 August 1740 – 26 June 1810) and Jacques-Étienne Montgolfier (; 6 January 1745 – 2 August 1799) – were aviation pioneers, balloonists and paper manufacturers from the commune Annonay in Ardèche, France. They invented the ''Montgolfière''-style hot air balloon, globe aérostatique, which launched the first confirmed piloted ascent by humans in 1783, carrying Jacques-Étienne. Joseph-Michel also invented the self-acting hydraulic ram (1796) and Jacques-Étienne founded the first paper-making vocational school. Together, the brothers invented a process to manufacture transparent paper. Early years Joseph-Michel and Jacques-Étienne Montgolfier were born into a family of paper manufacturers. Their parents were Pierre Montgolfier (1700–1793) and Anne Duret (1701–1760), who had 16 children. Pierre Montgolfier established his eldest son, Raymond (1730–1772), as his successor. Joseph-Michel was the 12th child. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hot Air Balloon
A hot air balloon is a lighter-than-air aircraft consisting of a bag, called an envelope, which contains heated air. Suspended beneath is a gondola or wicker basket (in some long-distance or high-altitude balloons, a capsule), which carries passengers and a source of heat, in most cases an open flame caused by burning liquid propane. The heated air inside the envelope makes it buoyant, since it has a lower density than the colder air outside the envelope. As with all aircraft, hot air balloons cannot fly beyond the atmosphere. The envelope does not have to be sealed at the bottom, since the air inside the envelope is at about the same pressure as the surrounding air. In modern sport balloons the envelope is generally made from nylon fabric, and the inlet of the balloon (closest to the burner flame) is made from a fire-resistant material such as Nomex. Modern balloons have been made in many shapes, such as rocket ships and the shapes of various commercial products, though the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Neva (Russian Warship)
''Neva'' (russian: Нева) was the British merchant ship ''Thames'', launched in 1801, that the Russians bought in 1803, and renamed ''Neva''. She participated in two trips to the Far East, the first of which was the first Russian circumnavigation of the world. She was wrecked in January 1813. ''Thames'' ''Thames'' was a -long, three-masted sailing ship of 370 tons burthen, built in Britain in 1801. Russian career In 1802 Lieutenant Commander Yuri Feodorovich Lisyansky travelled to Britain where he bought two vessels, ''Thames'' and ''Leander'', on his own account. ''Thames'' and ''Leander'' left England for the Baltic in May 1803, docking at Kronstadt on 5 June. Czar Alexander I renamed ''Thames'' to ''Neva'', after the river, and ''Leander'' to '' Nadezhda'' ("Hope"). The two vessels sailed in 1803 on a voyage that would become the first Russian circumnavigation of the world. For the voyage ''Neva'' carried 14 cannon and a crew of 43 men under Lisyansky's command. The comm ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nadezhda (1802 Russian Ship)
} ''Nadezhda'' (or ''Nadeshda'', or ''Nadeshada'' ) was a three-masted sloop, the ex-British merchantman and slave ship ''Leander'', launched in 1799. A French privateer captured her in 1801, but she quickly came back into British hands. Private Russian parties purchased her in 1802 for the first Russian circumnavigation of the world (1803-1806), and renamed her. Although it is common to see references to the " frigate ''Nadezhda''", she was a sloop, not a frigate, and she was never a warship. After her voyage of exploration she served as a merchant vessel for her owner, the Russian-American Company, and was lost in 1808. Career British merchant vessel ''Leander'' was launched in London in late 1799 as a c.430-ton (bm) merchant sloop. On 3 December 1799 her master, C. Anderson, received a letter of marque.Letter of Marqu- accessed 14 May 2011. The 1800 and 1801 editions of ''Lloyd's Register'' showed her launch year as 1799, Anderson as her master, T. Huggins as her owner, an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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