Climate and Pleasure in 

 California. 



ALBXANOBR O. McADIB, ProleMor om«t«orolos7, Uoited Stmfs WMtb*r BnrM*. 



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HE best-laid plans of mice and men gang aft agley," wrote Robert 

 Burns; and he might have added: "Sometimes on account of the 

 weather." To a marked degree, our plans and pleasures are de- 

 pendent upon climatic conditions. The simplest of outings, the 

 most elaborate indoor function, alike acknowledge the supremacy of 

 the weather. Nor is it necessary that a great storm or marked 

 atmospheric disturbance occur to upset plans and mar pleasures. The 

 gently insistent fog, the soft-falling but steadily accumulating snow, the 

 change of unseen but not unfelt temperature, may measure out success or 

 failure, accomplishment or abandonment, just as surely as the wrath of 

 the storm or the tumult of the waters. In fact, so dependent is mankind 

 upon climatic environment that some writers have attempted to prove that 

 national and racial characteristics were largely due to climatic Influences. 

 Following this line of reasoning, it has been claimed that the people of New 

 England were economical, full of grit, inquisitive and restless because of 

 their climate; the people of the Middle West, energetic, enterprising, never 

 satisfied, because of their climate; the people of the South easy going, high 

 spirited, masterful, because of their climate; and the people of the Pacific 

 Coast ADMIRABLE IN EVERY RESPECT because of their climate. Would 

 that It were true that the laws connecting human development and climatic 

 environment were so simple and direct. But most of us know that more 

 variables than the single one of climate must be reckoned with in dis- 

 cussing the origin of character. So, too, with disease; especially infectious 

 disease. Too much has been claimed for, or rather laid at the door of, 

 climate. Doubtless climatic conditions favor the development and activity 

 of certain germs; but the responsibility for their invasion of the human 

 body must now be shifted from impersonal, irresponsible climate to the 

 personal responsible man, who often ignorantly, but sometimes knowingly, 

 neglects proper sanitary precautions. All will admit, however, that favor- 

 able climatic conditions count for much in restoring health, once impaired; 

 and other things being equal, the invalid stands a better chance to regain 

 his strength in a climate free from extremes than in one of marked variabil- 

 ity. The climate of California unquestionably makes for health, comfort 

 and pleasure. It is a climate that iFavors the strong as well as the feeble. 

 Both north and south of the Tehachapi, the climate encourages outdoor life. 

 In the interior, during the long summer days, the heat is too intense for 

 active work; but with this exception, one can work or play in the open 

 throughout the year in California. The so-called winter months are per- 

 haps the pleasantest of the year, and while there are days when the rain 

 falls steadily and heavily (and he who is on pleasure bent at such times 

 must stay indoors), the weather from November to April is on the whole 

 beyond complaint. 



Some idea of the relative frequency of rain may not be out of place 

 at this point, inasmuch as the impression is widespread that a rainy season 

 must necessarily mean continuous and heavy rains. The rainy season in 

 California, as a rule, resembles the months of May or June in the East. In 

 San Francisco, for example, last year there were fifty-eight rainy days. 

 These occurred as follows: January 10, February 8, March 16, November 

 6, December 8, and the balance in the other months. There were, there- 

 fore, about forty-seven rainy days in the rainy period of five months. It 

 should be stated, however, that, taking the records for the past fifty-seven 

 years, the average number of rainy days in a year at San Francisco is 

 •eventy-one. Once, in a very rainy year, the number reached 105. At 



