News in 2016
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FIG Honorary Member Jan de Graeve receives Belgian Order
December 2016, Belgium
Jan de Graeve receives the Belgian Order by
Didier Reynders, Foreign Minister of Belgium.
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The King of Belgium has granted the Belgian Officier de la
Couronne (Order of the Crown) to FIG Honorary Member Jan de
Graeve. The Order was presented by The Belgian Foreign Minister
Didier Reynders on 12 December 2016.
Jan de Graeve has been
President of the Association of Surveyors in Belgium and has
also been an eminent member of the executive committee of the
Brussels Map Circle, which brings together specialists in maps,
atlases, urban views, whether scientists, experts, amateurs or
collectors. He has made a reconstruction of the library of
Gérard Mercator, including many works of the 16th century with
an unrivaled museum quality.
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For many years Jan de Graeve has been a well know face in FIG.
He has been enjoying more than 35 years active participation to FIG
events since his first meeting in Paris 1978, where he brought an
exhibition of the start of FIG in 1878 and some of the original
photos of the first meetings and also all the reports and publications
of all the FIG congresses. He has only missed very fey yearly
conferences and meetings since then, and we hope to see him at many
future Working Weeks and Congresses.
He was one of the founders of the FIG International Institute for
History of Surveying and Measurement. For some years it operated within
one the nine commissions of FIG but as from the Congress held in
Brighton in 1998 it was deemed a Permanent Institution. Today Jan de
Graeve is still director of IIHS&M.
Each year Jan de Graeve, together with other members of IIHS&M,
espeically Jim Smith and John Brock have successfully organised a
History Symposium in connection with the yearly FIG Conference. There
will be no exception in 2017 where they are planning a special day
Sunday 28 May 2017 at Messukeskus Exhibition & Convention Centre with an
- as always - very impressive programme and a focus on the Struve
Geodetic Arc.
http://fig.net/fig2017/history.htm
Over the 30th arc. Jan was rewarded to become a honorary member of
FIG!
This honour is more than deserved with the many years of various
contributions to FIG hereunder as chairman of commission 1 and to have
the Struve Meridian Arc inscribed on the World Heritage List of UNESCO,
the first scientific work inscribed and the first inscription involving
also 10 countries
The distinction was followed by a presentation on the theme "Scientific
measuring instruments in the 16th century".
FIG Congratulates Jan de Graeve.
All photos kindly from:
http://www.didierreynders.be/2016/12/12/remise-de-la-distinction-dofficier-dans-lordre-de-la-couronne-a-jan-de-graeve/
Louise Friis-Hansen
20 December 2016
