In 1616 William Baffin, coasting up the icebound west coast of Greenland, reported: ‘The first of July we were come into an open sea, in the latitude of 75 degrees 40 minutes, which a new revived our hope of a passage…’ (Purchas 1625). From this point, at an unspecified longitude in the north part of Melville Bay, he cruised for 12 days in open water, up the Greenland coast to 77°30'N and down the west side of Baffin Bay to Bylot Island, seeing and naming on the way Smith, Jones, and Lancaster sounds. From Bylot Island south he found ‘a ledge of ice between the shoare and us’ as he continued past Pond Inlet and down the coast of Baffin Island. This is the first mention in written records, and the first known navigation, of an area that became well known two centuries later as the ‘North Water’.

Where the ever-rolling waves of the ocean throw their white foam on to the coast of France and change colour as the weather changes, Jules Verne was born. Where sailors and fishermen returned with their merchandise and strange creatures of the sea, the boy grew up. Dreaming of strange and far-away countries, he spent his free hours at the harbour in his birthplace Nantes. Perhaps it was in these early days in the second quarter of the nineteenth century that the foundation was laid for the ideas realised in the numerous books he wrote later. Books which were called by many a biographist fantastic, or, what is more, prophetic. See, wrote some biographers, how Jules Verne saw things which did not exist in his day. The tendency to exaggerate the prophetic qualities of the well-known author is increasing in this day of spaceflight and atomic submarines.

For a full decade, the Office of Naval Research (ONR) led the United States into the development of science by research contract. Marine geophysics and oceanography were a part of this, as were the solid earth sciences and meteorology.

By 1950, ONR was firmly established, World War II seemed far behind, and oceanographers in the United States were enthusiastically looking forward to what turned out to be ten years of their most productive work. By combining oceanographic talent and ONR funds and logistics, there was created one of the most effective systems yet invented for accomplishing science and technology at sea.

New institutions were established, old institutions revived, fleets were designed, deep diving initiated, ocean monitoring begun, Arctic oceanography started, expeditions mounted, and discoveries made which, when coupled with other knowledge, were to contribute to far-reaching consequences for the earth sciences and how we now view our geophysically active planet.

The oceanographers will speak for themselves. This paper presents only the view from Washington at the time, and how at least some of the activity there helped to make possible the Great Decade of Oceanographic Development, 1950–59.

The Indian Ocean has been the scene of varied activities of ancient explorers and maritime traders from the very beginnings of recorded history. Experience of early pioneers has led to much information on the sea pertaining to weather, winds, currents, waves and tides. Although their observations were often correct, the ideas derived from them lacked precision and clarity, but they succeeded in forming a good general picture of the physical conditions prevailing in the northern Indian Ocean. Historically, the subject is of considerable interest, for the ideas concerning the physical aspects of the Indian Ocean have been expressed in the semi-scientific terminology of the times. The principal sources which preserve these early concepts are either of Indian or of Mediterranean origin. The Indian sources are derived mainly from literary (Sanskrit, Pali and Tamil) and archaeological (excavations, numismatics and paintings) records and findings. Of the Mediterranean sources, the Greeks have been the principal contributors through their writings and records pertaining to travel towards Asian and African Coasts.

Though Russia, in contrast with England, had no broad access to the oceans, Russian oceanographers always took a great interest in the world ocean investigations. To confirm this we would first of all like to mention the Russian cruises around the world, made by I. F. Krusenstern and Ju. F. Lisjansky in 1803–06, V. M. Golovnin in 1806–13 and 1817–19, M. P. Lazarev in 1819–21 and 1822–25 (the second voyage, the main result of which was the discovery of the Antarctic Continent, was made together with F. F. Bellingshauzen), O. E. Kotsebu in 1815–18 and 1823–26, and F. O. Litke in 1826–29. The names of several Russian explorers who carried on important work in various parts of the Arctic and the Pacific Oceans in different periods of the nineteenth century are well known. At one time valuable results of the oceanological investigations, carried out by Admiral S. O. Makarov on the ship Vitjaz in the Pacific Ocean in 1886–89, attracted much attention. The fact that Vitjaz is lettered on the pediment of the Oceanographical Museum of Monaco among the ten ships most distinguished in oceanographical explorations from the whole world testifies to the scientific importance of Makarov's investigations.

The evolution of deep-sea investigations with the use of diving-vessels is directly connected to the development of submarine navigation. It seems that a trustworthy elucidation of some historical facts will help to restore the real picture of this branch of oceanology. We are speaking about the Russian and Soviet contribution to the development of submarine navigation and, later, underwater investigations, which is insufficiently elucidated in modern works on the history of depth development. This necessitates reviving some events directly connected with the subject under consideration in the form of brief references.

One of the first diving attempts in connection with marine exploration was started some 400 km from Edinburgh. On September 8, 1820, the Swiss physician Louis- Theodore Colladon [1] submerged in a diving-bell 10 m deep to the bottom of the sea at Howth, near Dublin (Ireland). During an hour's stay under water he observed and measured the ground. Being a diving doctor, he did not only take an interest in technical dates concerning the diving-bell, but he also kept a diary where he noted the professional divers inside the bell were supplied with additional nourishment as bread and brandy ‘in order to regain soonest their lost strength’.

This paved the way for human entry into the sea, and henceforth science and research could be extended from the continents to the submarine field. People became aware of the ocean's importance which covers 71 per cent, of the terrestrial globe. Men invaded the element from where all life on earth seemed to descend.

The evolution of oceanographic textbooks received tremendous impetus from the Challenger Expedition both directly and indirectly. Direct contributions resulted from the writings of the scientific staff that served on board the epic three and a half year voyage of H.M.S. Challenger. Textbooks resulted indirectly from the writings of numerous marine scientists, ashore, who studied and worked on the data, samples and specimens from the 362 stations in three oceans collected by the Expedition. The immense mass of new facts revealed by the Challenger Expedition stimulated the development of new facets of marine science research found in all oceanography texts of the twentieth century.

The Royal Irish Academy, founded in the year 1785, is Ireland's leading learned society. Since its foundation it has contributed greatly to Irish scholarship and culture through a wide range of activities, including the publication of work in many fields of human endeavour. These activities are probably well known, but the fact that the Academy organised a number of valuable marine explorations in the last two decades of last century is less well known.

Modern ship routing is a matter for specialist forecasters using a mass of meteorological observations processed by large, high-speed electronic computers, as will appear below.

Historically, some form of routing has been practised for centuries as the result of observations made by navigators and explorers as they gradually laid bare the geography of the earth's oceans and continents.

It cannot be known whether the very early navigators followed routes based on weather considerations, but they may have done so in limited areas of the globe. There is some reason to suppose that the Atlantic islands and even perhaps the West Indies were known to the Phoenicians. Legends which suggest this are supported by the finding of a stock of fourth century b.c. Phoenician coins at Corvo in the Azores. It has been reasonably supposed in some quarters that these coins were from a Phoenician trader wrecked on the island whilst on passage westwards, but how far west we cannot be sure.

It has never been seriously doubted that the north-east coast of America was discovered and temporarily colonised by Vikings from Greenland during the latter part of the first century A.D. Certain archaeological finds have been held by some to support this view. An account of some early pioneering voyages has been given by Villiers (1956).

These early voyages can hardly have been consciously weather routed, though some knowledge of the prevailing wind conditions may well have been acquired. Perhaps it was as late as the end of the fifteenth century that the first known weather-routed voyage was made. Henry the Navigator (Prince Henry of Portugal) was intent on finding a way round the Cape into the Indian Ocean in order to oust the Venetians and Arabs from their lucrative trading in that area. He fitted out expedition after expedition, but they all turned back as they hugged the African coast and were caught in the doldrums. Eventually they learned to stand well out to sea and so get the benefit of the N.E. trades and in 1434 they reached the equator. However, it was another half-century before the Cape was reached and this could conceivably be regarded as the first weather-routed voyage.

Throughout this paper optimum ship routing will mean the route, optimum from the viewpoint of a criterion, such as minimum crossing time ensuring the greatest possible safety, fuel saving, etc.

The term ‘method of choice’ can be interpreted in two ways. On the one hand, it includes the amount of data (and the form of their representation) on the basis of which the choice is made. On the other hand, it implies the instruments used, whether it be intuition or strict mathematical calculations.

The term 'method of choice' can be interpreted in two ways. On the one hand, it includes the amount of data (and the form of their representation) on the basis of which the choice is made. On the other hand, it implies the instruments used, whether it be intuition or strict mathematical calculations.

After an introductory survey of seventeenth-century approaches to the subject, two important examples of tide-measuring activity in the eighteenth-century are described. The five years’ continuous observations at Brest, 1711–16, involved great perseverence in effort and accuracy. The treatment of the records by Cassini and their later retrieval by Lalande affords an interesting lesson in the publication of scientific data. The observations made at St Helena in 1761 are remarkable for having been made with high precision by leading astronomers in difficult swell conditions. Finally, a method is described of using these data to search for small differences in the oceanic tides between the eighteenth-century and the present, with a brief discussion of the results.

The surveys of temperature and salinity that have led to the concept that the Gulf Stream splits into branches are reviewed, beginning with the survey made by Helland-Hansen on board the Michael Sars in 1910. The system of currents, or branches, between the Newfoundland Banks and the Mid- Atlantic deduced by the different investigations from charts of temperature, or by dynamic computation, are not all compatible. There is good evidence that part of the Gulf Stream turns south-east after passing the Newfoundland Banks and part turns north to become the North Atlantic Current. Both these currents are boundaries between water masses in the upper layer of the ocean. The evidence for permanent currents other than these two is conflicting.

In the early period of its development oceanography could not escape the reconnaisance stage and it was preoccupied with the accumulation of a wide range of observations. Fifty to seventy years ago information on the structure and specific features of the ocean was so scarce that any measurement, whether it be temperature or salinity at a given depth or any other parameter, was regarded by scientists as a revelation close to a scientific achievement. At this period the state of theoretical knowledge was not at a stage to formulate any definite demands towards oceanic measurements—there was a need to measure and describe all events and parameters with maximal precision and in the greatest detail.

Sea-water chemistry has intrigued a variety of scholars for a variety of reasons. Dominant is a great curiosity to understand the nature of our surroundings—a quest that has involved the earliest philosophers to twentieth-century scientists such as those who penetrate the great depths of the oceans in such an artificial exo-skeleton as the bathyscaphe. The exploitations of both the living and mineral resources of the sea have motivated many investigations. The rising food demands for an increasing world population have resulted in extensive searches for the factors governing biological productivity, including the chemical species related to the photosynthetic activities of marine plants. Systematic marine mineral explorations utilise the results of investigations upon the chemical factors that govern precipitation processes in sea water and upon the chemical make-up of rivers. More recently, the remarkable abilities of human society to alter the compositions of the waters and airs of the environment have necessitated an immediate expansion in our knowledge of oceanic chemistries in order to predict the responses of the marine environment, including its inhabitants, to such incursions. By such stimuli the moods of marine chemistry have been fashioned over the past two centuries.

The interest of man in the role of water in his life dates back to 700–600 b.c. Water is an indispensable part of any life on the earth. Various kinds of suggestions were made concerning the nature and the properties of water in the course of more than two thousand years. Only in the eighteenth century M. Lomonosov gained a penetrating insight into the chemical problems of that time and brought chemistry to the level of science dealing with the composition and qualitative changes of natural substance. He suggested that river wafers were solutions of salts discharged into the sea.

Two thermodynamic schemes have been developed to describe the CO2 system in sea water. The ‘pure’ treatment is based on the theory of dilute solutions and is general. The ‘pseudo’ treatment uses ‘stoichiometric’ constants related to the acidity constants of Bronsted (1928). It is empirical and specific to the medium in which the measurements are made. The pure thermodynamic treatment developed from the early attempts to characterise the various equilibria involving CO2, carbonic acid and its anions and was much influenced by the work of biochemists and physiologists on the blood plasma system. These attempts were initiated before the concepts of complete dissociation or of activities were developed. The subsequent application of these concepts was immediate and fruitful. By 1927, especially as a result of the work of Warburg and of Hastings and Sendroy, a consistent scheme had been developed for the NaCl—NaHCO3—Na2CO3 system. This work had also been extended to phosphate, citrate and blood plasma solutions and the discrepancies between the apparent activity coefficients discussed and tentatively ascribed to complex formation.

Johnston and co-workers developed the thermodynamic treatment of the carbonate system in natural waters and by 1920 understood the relation between ΣCO2, alkalinity and carbonate solubility and had identified and solved the major analytical difficulties.

The discovery of the interference due to complexing prompted various workers to determine empirical 'apparent' or stoichiometric constants. These are derived from the experimental data by assuming that a function analogous to the pure constant, but defined in terms of total species concentrations rather than activities, will behave like the pure constant over the temperature, salinity and pressure range of interest and will not vary with the concentration of any of the species it describes. Starting with the work of Moberg and Buch in the early 1930s, a complete scheme has been developed based on this treatment. The apparent constants for carbonic and boric acids in sea water are now known with sufficient accuracy to allow detailed study of the effect of water chemistry on the formation and dissolution of carbonates under any oceanic conditions.

Marcet reported in 1822 that sea salt contained lime, and several investigators confirmed its presence in sea water in the 1830s. Darondeau found dissolved CO2 in sea water in 1838, and von Bibra in 1851 considered sea water to be slightly alkaline. Tornöe in 1880 pointed out that this condition required part of the CO2 to be bound chemically, and Hamberg applied the mass action law to the CO2-system in sea water in 1885. For nearly 50 years, however, despite the development of the concepts of pH and activity, attempts to apply the law in detail failed, first because the behaviour of H2CO3 and HCO3− as weak acids is strikingly different in pure water, sea water or NaCl solutions, and secondly because the presence and role of another weak acid, boric acid, was not recognised fully until 1933. Investigators often attributed their failures to some mysterious ability of the sea to disregard or evade the laws of physical chemistry. Buch in 1933 and 1938 finally laid this hobgoblin to rest, and his results are still accepted with only minor modifications.

Chemical oceanography is fundamentally concerned with the chemical properties of sea water. In order to study these properties, and the interactions of sea waterkwith other phases, we must first have some concept of what sea water.

The German professor of physiology, August Pütter, is remembered especially for his theories on the nutrition of marine animals. His major papers, ‘The nutrition of aquatic animals’ and ‘Organic matter in the sea’, appeared in 1907, followed by numerous other papers until 1925. He died about 1935. Ranson (1935,1936), Assistant at the Paris Museum of Natural History, gives the essence of the works of Pütter as follows (translated from the French):

1. Aquatic animals are not able to capture by the means which they possess enough organisms or planktonic materials to cover their nutritional requirements.

2. There is a very large amount of dissolved organic matter in sea water which, alone, is broadly sufficient to sustain the needs of the animals.

3. This soluble organic matter has as its source the activity of algae and bacteria.

4. The fundamental part of the nutritional requirements of aquatic animals is derived from dissolved organic matter; plankton plays only a secondary role.

5. Aquatic animals absorb this organic matter not only by their digestive apparatus which is often rudimentary, but by the whole exterior surface of their bodies and especially by simple epithelial tissues such as the gills.