NavList:

Frank Reed, Leo Tobin

Re your NavList posts concerning the Kotlaric Star Finder, I too had seen comments thereon in an older edition of Bowditch, alas I had never been able to garner any information on the thing beyond that appearing in Bowditch.

Eventually I contacted the Defense Attache at the Embassy of Serbia in Washington. That gentleman referred me to the Embassy of Croatia, as they have the coastline and naval interests, Serbia being inland.

An exchange of emails with Croatian officials elicited the following. The Star Finder was out of print, though the navy had some copies, not for sale. I was told that I possibly might obtain one, for research, scientific investigation, non-commercial use. As I was simply curious about the thing, I so stated, indicating my personal, non-commercial interest. I have since received a set of 3 volumes. One being New Star Finder (Second Edition)a book of star charts including a template. Text is in Croatian language with an English language explanation. A second volume is entitled Table K1, with explanations in both English and Croatian. At a casual glance, these tables appear similar to the tables HO 214 and 229, neither of which I'm really familiar with. The first and second volumes appear to be what are offered via abebooks.com, mentioned by Frank. In passing, such email inquiries I addressed to the officials of foreign governments received most prompt and courteous attention.

Lest I forget, having inquired of the library at the U.S. Naval Observatory, Washington, D.C., I received from them via email, a copy of a manual they had on the Kotlaric Star Finder. What they sent me appears to be a copy of New Star Finder. Should anyone be interested, assuming that I can find their email in my computer, I will post same on the site, let me know.

Alan

A third volume, a smaller book is entitled New Methods of Ship Position Finding From Celestial Observations is printed entirely in the Croatian language, I do not read this language, other than to note that there are references within to Table K1
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