The Times Atlas of the Moon

[Moonshed]

I purchased this wonderful atlas in 1969, the year of publication, and every now and again will refer to it after having taken a lunar photograph to establish the precise area covered. The detail is amazing, even down to the contour lines, and the quality of the paper it is printed on is first class. I love the opening words on the rear cover: “Man has walked on the moon and a new kind of map is needed. This atlas now provides it for him. “”Let us create vessels and sails adjusted to the heavenly ether, and men will present themselves who are unafraid of the boundless voids.”” wrote the astronomer Johannes Kepler in 1610.” How true that proved to be 359 years later.

I can’t help wondering how many other members may have also purchased this superb atlas and indeed still use it.

 

 

 

Edited December 18, 2020 by Moonshed

[mikemarotta]

I love the contour lines. I have several maps of the Moon. None with lines. I had a couple of classes in geography and geographic information systems as a graduate student. I also had map-reading classes in the military. It just never clicked with me that a map of the Moon needs the same vocabulary. Thanks.

 

[Moonshed]

8 hours ago, mikemarotta said:

I love the contour lines. I have several maps of the Moon. None with lines. I had a couple of classes in geography and geographic information systems as a graduate student. I also had map-reading classes in the military. It just never clicked with me that a map of the Moon needs the same vocabulary. Thanks.

 

I have never seen any other moon maps with contour lines either, and to think they had this much detail back in the ‘60s.

Mind you they needed that much detail, they were going to land astronauts on its surface and they didn’t want their landers heading into unexpected crater fields at the last minute, that could have resulted in a very different outcome.

I think that today’s generation with their sat nav mobiles and cars do not appreciate the importance of having accurate maps and the impact they have had over the centuries regarding everything from heroic explorers, scientific explorations, road building, laying pipe lines, the Panama Canal, planning a battle, the list goes on.

I laugh now when I remember the days of driving a Ford Transit full of Tupperware products to various London destinations with the A - Z of London Streets open on my lap and trying to quickly study it at traffic lights and busy junctions. But you know what? It worked! Not only that but I very quickly learned my way around whereas today using a sat nav drivers can cover the exact same route ten times and still have no idea without it.

Sorry, I’m rambling again, it’s lockdown cabin fever. 

[mikemarotta]

1 hour ago, Moonshed said:

... Ford Transit full of Tupperware products to various London destinations with the A - Z of London Streets open on my lap ...  I very quickly learned my way around whereas today using a sat nav drivers can cover the exact same route ten times and still have no idea without it. 

Well, we are getting away from the Moon here, but that point came out in one of my classes. Our professor was taking some other grad students to a project and the prof complained to me once that the driver relied on the GPS. (This was 2010.) And after several trips to the same place still did not know the route -- or apparently recognize it when they arrived.  Ground truth. In geography, we call it "ground truth." And it applies here to astronomy with spectroscopy, etc. You can have "yellow." But is it a radiation, an absorption of colors not-yellow with reflection, or filtering? You don't know until you go there and get the ground truth.

[Mr Spock]

Classic atlas. It would be nice to have a modern update.

[markse68]

29 minutes ago, Mr Spock said:

Classic atlas. It would be nice to have a modern update.

Came a cross this in another thread- could  it be a contender?

https://mailchi.mp/oculum/reader-survey2020

Mark

 

[MartinHiggins]

Beautiful map work. I fancied getting a copy so just checked prices, cheapest I could find £114.00 and way north from there!

[kirkster501]

I am a big enthusiast of lunar observing, though no expert and I have seen that book before. It is indeed beautiful.  However, times move on.  What a printed atlas cannot do is mirror and invert left to right the view seen through the EP the way that a digital atlas can.  That said, I still use a printed atlas as well sometimes.  
 

Google moon is superb.

[PeterW]

Would love to have one, but I think the maps are from the NASA Apollo LAC charts. I recently inspired someone to stretch and stitch the whole load to produce a large binoculars hole disk map that is easier to use than lots of little segments: 

https://www.cloudynights.com/topic/711469-whole-moon-lac-chart/

there is also a new edition of the Virtual Moon Atlas which has a lot of chart options.

Peter