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Jane Squire

Jane Squire (c.1700 - 4th April 1733) was an amateur scientist who proposed a scheme for solving the longitude problem in the mid eighteenth century. She is a remarkable example of engagement with natural philosophical concerns in the period, as well as showing marked feminist convictions.

Life

Little of Squire's early life is known until she published the first draft of her proposal for finding longitude in 1731, but given that she had her ideas fully prepared by then she was probably born around 1700. She came from a well-off and well-connected family, as attested by her confidence approaching the high-profile male figures who judged the longitude problem. She was unusually vocal about her Catholicism for the period, and struggled with being labelled a 'popish recusant.' Her choice to publish one edition of her proposal in both French and English may also suggest French ancestry. She lived at a range of locations in London Unwise investment in a project for salavaging shipwrecks led her to lose a large sum of money and spend time in debtors prison. All experiences which may have added the bitter edge to her interactions with the Commissioners of Longitude. She died on 4th April 1743, her proposal still unrecognised.

Longitude Problem

Squire's publications dealt with the problem of measuring longitude at sea. This had gained wide public interest from 1714 when the British government passed an act establishing a Board of Commissioners with prize money to judge proposals for an accurate method of navigation. From the passage of the act, hundreds of pamphlets were published with schemes using chronometers, celestial observation, magnetic variation, dead reckoning and many more. Squire's was one of the more vociferous contributions to this debate.

Longitude Proposal

Squire's proposal involved training sailors to observe the night sky and locate stars within a series of 'cloves' which would divide the celestial space. She created a language of words that could be used to name each segment, and which related by word form to names for larger segments in the hierarchy ('Milduas', 'Mins', 'Minduas'). This was part of a wider project to re-create a universal language, itself part of the religious intentions of Squire's proposal. Her celestial map placed Bethlehem at the centre of the world, and she sought, with her universal language, to return civilisation to a status pre the Tower of Babel. She argued that her proposal would be easy to learn for young boys at naval schools, making them able to learn the stars by rote and know their longitude without knowledge of complex calculations. Her proposal was published three times, a short outline in 1731, a version in English and French in 1742, and a solely English version in 1743.

A large portion of the 1740s editions was taken up by correspondence that Squire had sent and received from various Commissioners of Longitude and high profile political figures. While none took her proposal seriously - despite repeated requests Squire never succeeded in getting the Commissioners to meet to consider her proposal, and they met to consider John Harrison's during the period of her correspondence - a number did take the time to reply carefully to her as a correspondent.