plotting board

American  

noun

1. Navigation.  a transparent table on a ship, used as a plotting sheet.

2. Military.  a device based on a map or other scale representation of a region against which artillery fire is to be directed, for use in directing artillery fire against a fixed or moving target.

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Etymology

Origin of plotting board

First recorded in 1900–05

Example Sentences

Bill’s position was to handle the early-warning plotting board.

From Washington Post

Sir: I hardly expected to see the Russian bear on NORAD's plotting board�but there it is.

From Time Magazine Archive

He had his mortar tube�but no base plate, no plotting board, no aiming stakes, no forward observer.

From Time Magazine Archive

The duty controller, an Air Force captain, was quickly called; he made a fast check of the targets that had now been put on the plotting board and called to a jet fighter-interceptor base for a scramble.

From Project Gutenberg

These reports, usually passed on to the Air Force through the Air Defense Command's Ground Observer Corps, merely went on the UFO plotting board as a statistic.

From Project Gutenberg