I think the 9 is there as I see it. Looks a bit like an S, but keep looking at it and the 9 will pop out if you close in the top of the S.
3249 on the unit, 3249 written inside the box, 324? on the outside of the box, and the seller indicating that it is 3249 on both the inside and outside of the box.
I don't think it takes the WIX braintrust or forensic photo analysis to figure this one out.
Andrew
Careful now, Andrew... you probably need to be more qualified in 'forensic photo analysis' to say such a thing...
Honestly Jeff, are you really challenging that the numbers are 3249? Do you really believe it is not a 9 given that the numbers on the box match the numbers on the instrument itself, verified by the seller of the unit? Or are you simply challenging anything that anyone on the Forum puts forth these days?
[/quote]
One might ask one's self as well, 'does it matter if it is a 9 or not?' Realizing you two are putting quite a puzzle together, for sure, but...
Seriously, it appears that enough of a pattern of randomness is evolving to well affirm what was said above - that this isn't likely to establish much true assurance of the Gardner-found box fitting the pattern, much less of giving any real certainty to Fred's ownership... but maybe I'm missing something.
[/quote]
Whether or not the number is a 9 won't solve the AE mystery. That is not the point. What it is about is basic research to understand the overall context of what was reported by Gallagher in 1940. When TIGHAR first got that report (a result of other basic research), we had no idea what the numbering system on the sextant box was all about, what did the two numbers have to do with each other, and whether or not it made any sense in the context of the castaway, AE, and TIGHAR's hypothesis. At first they seemed insignificant and certainly obscure.
Only through a bunch of persistent work over a long period of time looking for and documenting sextant numbers and the patterns they reveal, did the big picture emerge that the numbers on the sextant found with a castaway on Gardner Island meant that the sextant was most likely a US made, USN surplus Brandis sextant - exactly the kind that Noonan apparently used as a backup unit on the Pan Am Clippers. This is not only indicated by TIGHARs work, but also the work of whoever is blogging on
http://gardnerghost.blogspot.com who has made a pretty convincing chronology that shows the likelihood that 3500 / 1542 was a Brandis sextant issued to the USN, and even narrowed down the date of manufacture to 1917. Through my own analysis of the frame styles, it looks like Brandis 3500 was a 7.5 inch radius instrument vs a 6 inch radius instrument.
This dreary research on sextant numbers over many years is pretty boring, I agree, but it has pretty convincingly revealed that the Gardner Isle sextant box contained a USN surplus 7.5 inch radius Brandis sextant manufactured in 1917, something we didn't know when we started collecting information about sextants. Pretty amazingly precise information, don't you think? Who would have guessed we'd know so much about that sextant when we started collecting numbers.
The overall context is that a sextant box (and presumably sextant) with a particular number set was found with a known castaway from a particular era in a particular remote area of the world where at least two persons are known to be have gone missing, one of whom was known to use a Brandis Sextant as part of his navigational tools. These are incontestable facts. Coincidence? Maybe. Can you argue alternate sources? Sure. However, in the overall context of AE and FN, it makes sense that a Brandis sextant might be fond there. If it were a Russian sextant, it would not fit with the rest of the context. But it is not a Russian sextant, it is a US made, USN surplus Brandis sextant found on a British colonial island where it doesn't belong. Odd, don't you think? Isn't that worth trying to figure out?
We don't know what information might collected now might be important in the future. Maybe it won't be important - lord knows we've collected a lot of information that doesn't seem to be related - but that should not stop us from collecting the information. The more info we collect, the more likely we'll finally figure out if there was a sextant with that number combination, whether it was related to Noonan, and where the USNO archives are, and what they hold. Just because you and others think it frivolous to continue doesn't mean we shouldn't continue to do this and other basic research. Who knows what we might find. At least we're trying to figure it out.
With all due respect, as they say.
Andrew