ABSTRACT
Gordon Manley had resolved to place the record of the observatory on a similar basis to that of the Radcliffe Observatory at Oxford, for which published tables of the record from 1815 were available. In the 18th century there was an increase in the concern of men of science to establish observatories supplied with the necessary instruments for the observation of astronomic and magnetic phenomena. Manley had been increasingly convinced that observations were carefully recorded the observatory. The standardisation of a long temperature series, particularly one that goes back to the days before the Stevenson screen, is a complex and essentially meticulous task. The maintenance of regular meteorological observations at one site for a period of more than 140 years is no mean achievement. Indeed it is not surprising that for one reason or another, over such a long period, the record should have flaws.
