STORMS A Xn WEATHER FORECASTS G7 



UvSeful and (livergini; paths, stand like lofty lioacon towers, mark- 

 ing the rugged pathway i)ursued by advancing civilization. 



Professor Buys-Rallot, of Utrecht, induced Holland to estab- 

 lish a weather service, with telegraphic rei)orts and forecasts, in 

 1860; England followed with a similar service in 18G1, and 

 France in 1863. The United States was the fourth government 

 to establish a permanent weather service, although its scientists 

 were the pioneers in discovering the })rogressive character of 

 storms and in demonstrating the practicability of weather serv- 

 ices. In 1869 Professor Cleveland Al)be published a weather 

 bulletin and forecast at Cincinnati, based upon simultaneous 

 observations secured by telegraph from about 30 stations. 



From the introduction of the electro-magnetic telegraph in 

 1844 down to 1869 intermittent and desultory advocations for a 

 government weather service were made by many in this country. 

 Finalh^ Dr Increase A. Lapham, of Milwaukee, student, scientist, 

 and philanthropist, so aroused the property and industrial in- 

 terests of the countr}^ b}^ the facts that he presented relative to 

 the destruction of life and property b^' storms on Lake Michigan 

 that Congress, under the provisions of a bill introduced by Gen- 

 eral Halbert E. Paine, was induced to api)roi)riate money to 

 initiate such a service. To General All)ert J. Myer, Chief Signal 

 OfHcer of the United States Army, was intrusted the duty of in- 

 augurating a tentative weather scu'vice by deidoying over the 

 country as observers the military signalmen of his command. 



The system liy which the United States Weather Bureau col- 

 lects meteorological observations and makes weather forecasts 

 may be briefly described as follows. This morning at 8 o'clock, 

 Washington time — which, by the way, is about 7 o'clock at 

 Chicago, 6 o'clock at Denver, and 5 o'clock at San Francisco — 

 the observers at about 150 stations scattered throughout the 

 United States were taking their observations, and, from carefully 

 tested and standardized instruments, noting all the elementary 

 conditions of the air at the bottom of the great aerial ocean in 

 which we live, and which, by its variations of heat and cold, sun- 

 shine, cloud, and tempest, affects not only the health and happi- 

 ness of man, but his commercial and industrial welfare. 



By 8.25 a. m. the necessary mathematical corrections have 

 been made, the observations have been red.uced to cii)her, and 

 each has been filed at the local telegraph oflice. During the 

 next 30 or 40 minutes these observations, with the right of way 



