NavList:

Hello all,

I just returned ( to Nebraska ) from a vacation in Australia.  All of the cities that I stayed at had martime musems. I would ask questions about navigation and because of the discussion on the South Pacific scrap paper I would ask about almanacs.

Most of the old-timers remembered small booklets that were sold containing local info - harbor lights, reefs, what to avoid, etc. but would always include EOT and Dec. for a few years.  It seems that most navigators or ships masters had the bigger books with log tables, sin, haversine, etc that never went out of date ( like our Bowditch ) and because they only did Cel Nav with the sun a simple table of EOT and Dec was all the almanac needed.

Did the American sailors use simalar small booklets or did they carry the Nautical Almanac?  We have talked before about the offical almanac being more for astronmers than seamen.  I seemes to me that a local printer could rip out the table of EOT and Dec, print out many and sell them for a few cents.  Include some local info and you would have a Farmers Almanac for seamen.

Does anyone know of such a booklet?

Thanks in advance.      John H.