I offer my translation of a short article by John Edward Quinlan, who is named in it as the plenipotentiary topographer of the islands of Saint Lucia and Saint Vincent of the British West Indies. The article is not dated, but judging by the fact that the author mentions the events of 1906, but does not mention the Panama Canal, opened in 1914, in his presentation, it is easy to assume that its publication falls on this period. In my opinion, the article is interesting not only for how simply and logically the author proves the inconsistency of the official "scientific" views on the shape of the Earth and the distance to the Sun, but also for the essence of his arguments, from which it follows that at the beginning of the 20th century the argument about keeping everything and the whole force of gravity was by no means dominant and is not even cited here as a counterargument. So…
An indisputable fact is the fact that the earth is an extended plane with an uneven surface, and not a spherical or spherical shape with two flattened extremities, as scientists and astronomers assure in their reasoning, which most people believe. It also does not have the shape of a pear, as Professor V. D. Sollas at the Royal Association at Albemarle Street, London.
The fact that the earth is flat can be confirmed by our senses from all points of view. Practical demonstrations of this form will satisfy any open-minded and sane mind; numerous indications of a similar shape of the earth can be found in the sacred word of God - the Bible.
I am sure that the very first question the sharers will ask me will be: how do ships sail around the world if the earth is not a ball? As an answer, think about the fact that ships cannot bend around the earth in the same course, be it a ball or a plane. This is not possible except at a latitude south of Cape Horn. Everywhere between this southern latitude and the Arctic, land will be in the way. However, once airships have been perfected, travelers will be able to follow the same route, changing from one vehicle to another as water and land change.
The magnetic compass, which helps the traveler determine the course, always points to magnetic north if there are no local forces of gravity. Magnetic North is close to the North Pole. The North Pole is the center of an extended plane - the earth - and not one of the two flattened extremities of a spherical world, as we are often assured.
The magnetic attraction to the North Pole was discovered not by white scientists and astronomers, but by knowledgeable Chinese, who knew then, as their descendants know today, that the earth is flat.
Take a piece of cardboard and draw a circle on it with a compass. The center point of the circle will represent the position of the North Pole on flat earth, and the circular line will represent its southern edge, but not the South Pole. There is not and cannot be such a place as the South Pole. Draw a second circle between the center point and the outer circle, and this center line will represent the equator.
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Place a magnet near the center of the circle and a receptive needle somewhere inside the outer circle and the needle will be forced to point to the center. It should be. The right side of the needle will point to the east, the left side to the west, and the opposite side to the south.
Place one leg of the compass at the center of the circle and the other to the right of the needle and draw a circle with it so that it touches the needle on the left side. This will plot a course east. Repeat the operation in the opposite direction. From the left side of the needle, draw a circle to the right, and you have a western route on flat ground.
Therefore, it is possible to draw and eventually lay a universal path around the earth's plane by means of a sea vessel and a controlled aircraft.
As a gasoline launch floats in circles around the islands on the lakes in London County Council Park, English children get a hands-on demonstration of the possibility of floating around flat land - represented by islands - on water that is always in its natural state - strictly horizontal.
Let the scientists and astronomers, confident that the earth is a ball, will provide us with some practical demonstration of this by placing a magnet near the North Pole of an artificial globe, and a needle anywhere on its convex surface. If this is done, it will become clear all the impossibility of the needle to turn towards the North Pole, as it does in natural conditions and on my cardboard. May they also provide us with a practical illustration of a ship sailing on a spherical ocean, like my ocean on a flat surface in the example of a gasoline launch sailing horizontally around the wrecks in London County Council Park.
A seagoing vessel could make a round-the-world voyage along part of a single route, say, along the equator as follows. It could travel from the east coast of Africa at equatorial level and continue eastward until it reaches the many East Indies. It would have swum over each of them until it reached the equator again at their eastern end. Further, it would continue its journey along a single route across the Pacific Ocean up to the western coast of South America. Then, sailing southerly, to and around Cape Horn, and again northward, to the equator near the mouth of the Amazon, from where it would move further across the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Guinea (where it would cross the Greenwich meridian) to the west coast of Africa and then to the south, to and around the Cape of Good Hope, after which a northern course would return to the pointfrom where it sailed; However, all this time the ship would move on a flat surface of the ocean, and by no means convex or spherical, and its captain would check the desired course with a flat map, and not with a globe.
Just as no sane person can imagine a description of a loop outside a circle, it is equally improbable for him to accept the ridiculous dogma of a ship sailing around the globe of the earth. He can only accept it by being misled.
If the ship I mentioned sailed along the equator around a spherical earth, every six hours it would find itself in the following different positions: at noon it would be in the horizontal position in which we imagine all ships; after six hours he would be in a perpendicular position, nose down; at midnight one would already be upside down; at six in the morning, he would again be in a perpendicular position, only the nose would now look up; at noon, a day later, it would be in its original horizontal state.
If, on the other hand, the ship were sailing north of the equator along the meridian, at six in the evening it would lie on its right side with horizontally positioned masts; at midnight it would be bottom up; at six in the morning - again on the side, now on the left, again with horizontal masts; and only at noon, as at the previous noon, would he find himself in the position in which we are accustomed to seeing ships. The reader would be quite amused by the description of this journey, with the position of the vessel being updated every hour, however, unfortunately, the limited space of the article does not allow me to do this.
The ship, docked at full load, has only a few feet of water under the keel. If it has a draft of 18 feet 3 inches at noon, the most scrupulous observation will not find any change in it, although at midnight, when the vessel is bottom up, a change in draft must take place. Will the scientists deign to explain this?
Having mentioned the Greenwich meridian, I must say, in connection with the interference allegedly caused by the London County Council power generating station at Greenwich to the delicate equipment of the Royal Observatory, that the Observatory should be removed, not the station. Observatories should be erected at the level of a large expanse of water, which would serve as a natural horizon. Great Britain is surrounded by such water: however, Great Britain is not suitable for a real observatory, for reasons which I will touch on in the next paragraph, and also because every meridian that crosses Great Britain crosses the equator in the middle of the ocean, where a sister observatory cannot be built.
Everyone agrees that twice a year on earth the same day and night are set, and the Sun is vertical to the earth at the equator, but not everyone knows that when the Sun is in this position - called the equinox - observers on the 45th degrees north and 45 degrees south latitude should mark 45 degrees as the angle of elevation from the horizon to the center of the Sun at noon, and that the points north or south of the equator from where the Sun is observed at that angle at noon mark the exact distance to the equator because The sun is above him. Such a point - on the north side of the equator - is located exactly in the middle between the equator and the North Pole. From this it follows that the distance from the Sun to the equator on the day of the equinox is equal to half the distance from the equator to the North Pole.
Therefore, two observatories are needed, one at the equator and the other 45 degrees north or south of it. There are no such observatories, and I would venture to suggest, without fear of contradiction, that on earth there are only two points on the same meridian - one at the equator, and the other 45 degrees north or south of it, where the angle to the Sun can be measured from the natural horizon. The Astronomer Royal and his fellow scientists now have the opportunity to save their face and name the location of these points before I make them public.
When observing from these two points, the distance from the Sun to the Earth, which is the very basis of all astronomical research, can be calculated exactly. Scientists and astronomers say it is nearly 93 million miles. How did they measure it?
Here is a practical illustration of the unmistakable method I have just shown for determining the exact distance to the Sun. Take a square piece of paper; each of the four sides makes an angle of 90 degrees, which gives a total of 360 degrees - the same as a circle. The four sides of the sheet are the same length. Fold the paper square diagonally to make a triangle. This triangle will not only be equilateral, but also have a diagonal at an angle of 45 degrees, or half of 90. Since the sides of the square had the same length, the two sides of the triangle, located perpendicular to each other, will also be equal in length.
Take your paper triangle so that one side of the right angle is facing the sky and the other is towards the North Pole, and imagine that the angle looking up is the Sun at noon equinox, and the other is a point on the earth 45 degrees north of equator; the third angle will be a point on the equator, perpendicular to the sun at the noon of the equinox, not a foot more or less. It doesn't matter if the earth is spherical or flat, this method determines the exact distance to the Sun
Therefore, scientists and astronomers who adhere to the spherical theory of the earth have no right to assert that the Sun is located approximately at such a distance from us, when there are two points with a natural horizon even in a spherical world to determine the exact distance. And with this approximation of the distance to the Sun, they measure the distance to other celestial objects. How much better it is to have an accurate and reliable base in order to make such measurements. Or is this method unknown to scientists and astronomers?
