Conspicuously not a Fortean.
Rupert Thomas Gould was born to a solid middle-class background in England 16 November 1890. He went into the navy early, where he studied navigation. His career, though, was waylaid an intense period of depression—one of many that would mark Gould’s life. At one point, he was in bed, mute, for a year. He was given a position in the hydrographer's department, and retired as a lieutenant commander.
He married Muriel Estall in 1917, and the two established a family; their son Cecil was born in 1918, and a daughter Jocelyne in 1920. Apparently, Gould had quite a bit of liberty in the hydrographer’s office. He studied naval history, especially British polar expeditions, and cartography. Most famously, he restored the marine chronometers of John Harrison, which had been essential in establishing ways for navigators to determine longitude. In 1923 he wrote “The Marine Chronometer, Its History and Development,” which, according to his biographer, the horologist Jonathan Betts, was a standard work for the next half century. (Gould had an engineering cast of mind, and also tinkered with—and wrote about—typewriters.)
Rupert Thomas Gould was born to a solid middle-class background in England 16 November 1890. He went into the navy early, where he studied navigation. His career, though, was waylaid an intense period of depression—one of many that would mark Gould’s life. At one point, he was in bed, mute, for a year. He was given a position in the hydrographer's department, and retired as a lieutenant commander.
He married Muriel Estall in 1917, and the two established a family; their son Cecil was born in 1918, and a daughter Jocelyne in 1920. Apparently, Gould had quite a bit of liberty in the hydrographer’s office. He studied naval history, especially British polar expeditions, and cartography. Most famously, he restored the marine chronometers of John Harrison, which had been essential in establishing ways for navigators to determine longitude. In 1923 he wrote “The Marine Chronometer, Its History and Development,” which, according to his biographer, the horologist Jonathan Betts, was a standard work for the next half century. (Gould had an engineering cast of mind, and also tinkered with—and wrote about—typewriters.)