Subject: Re: [BoundaryPoint] Plate Tectonics and Lat/Long boundaries<br/>
Date: Nov 13, 2003 @ 13:04<br/>
Author: Kevin Meynell (Kevin Meynell &lt;knm@...&gt;)<br/>
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<div id="ygrps-yiv-814393878">Adam,<br/>
<br/>
<blockquote><span title="ireply"> &gt;I&#39;ve seen old American maps somewhere (can&#39;t remember where) that showed <br/>
&gt;longitude relative to the dome of the Capitol in Washington.<br/>
<br/>
 </span></blockquote>The prime meridian (i.e. 0 degrees longitude) was only established as <br/>
running through Greenwich by the International Meridian Conference in 1884, <br/>
and later confirmed by treaty. This also confirmed the point at which <br/>
universal time would be measured (i.e. GMT or UTC to be more correct).<br/>
<br/>
I don&#39;t believe the international dateline has ever been established by <br/>
treaty, and is simply down to convention or the wishes of the territories <br/>
in the vicinity of 180 degrees. In particular, Kiribati moved it a long way <br/>
eastwards in 1995 so that all its islands would have the same date.<br/>
<br/>
Regards,<br/>
<br/>
Kevin Meynell</div>