meridian

The meridian line at Greenwich in London, England. A meridian line is an imaginary line that runs from the North Pole to the South Pole. By international convention, the meridian line at Greenwich, which runs through the Royal Observatory telescope, marks 0° longitude and is the point from which all other lines of longitude are measured.

Half a great circle drawn on the Earth's surface passing through both poles and thus through all places with the same longitude. Terrestrial longitudes are usually measured from the Greenwich Meridian.

An astronomical meridian is a great circle passing through the celestial pole and the zenith (the point immediately overhead).

Meridian

Town and administrative headquarters of Lauderdale County, east Mississippi; population (2000) 40,000. It is located 143 km/89 mi east of Jackson and 27 km/17 mi west of the Alabama state line. Meridian is an important centre for the cotton market and has cotton and timber mills. Other industries include electronic equipment, motor-vehicle parts, and clothing. It is home to Meridian Community College (1937) is here. A Naval Air Station is to the northeast of the town.

Settled in 1854 at the junction of two railway lines, it was a Confederate military centre (and briefly, in 1863, Mississippi's capital) until the town was destroyed in 1864 by William Tecumseh Sherman's troops. It recovered by the 1870s as a market centre for farm produce, cattle, and timber; by the early 20th century, textiles, wood and clay products, chemicals, and machinery were being made. Country music pioneer Jimmie Rodgers, the ‘Singing Brakeman’, was born in Meridian.