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Welcome to the WBZ Book Club.
I'm Jordan Rich. As the year comes

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to an end and a new one
unfolds, here's a book to ponder.

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Written in the nineteen nineties. It's
called Calendar, Humanity's epic struggle to determine

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a true and accurate year. The
author is David Ewing. Duncan takes a

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look historically and astronomically at the start
of the calendar experience, visiting the Pyramids

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of Giza, the Mayan observatories,
and Stonehenge, all the way up to

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the atomic clock, the official timekeeper. For the last sixty years. Just

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about every culture has produced great thinkers
who have added to our concept of time

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and calendar, from Julius Caesar to
Galileo to Copernicus to modern physicists such as

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Stephen Hawking. The author looks at
the creation of the mechanical clock and how

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Pope Gregory amended the calendar, which
was off by at least ten days.

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It's an adventure that spans the world, how populations have dealt with the seasons,

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and how the seasons have affected economies, and even who goes to war

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and when. A fascinating look in
a book called Calendar Humanities epic struggle to

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determine a true and accurate year.
The author is David Ewing Duncan, The

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Book Club WZ Boston's news radio