The sea coast echo. [volume] (Bay Saint Louis, Miss.) 1892-current, 1892-02-27
THE WEATHER BUREAU.
Some Interesting Facts In Regard to This
Branch of the Public Service.


Some Interesting Facts In Regard to This
Branch of the Public Service.
A visit to the Cotton Exchange in
search Of weather information discloses
the fact that the old time-worn sign
''U. s. Signal Service" which for so
many years has guided the citizens
of Memphis, to the dignitary who
''keeps the cases. on the blizzards and
cold waves, has given place to brand
new card bearing "U. s. Department of
Agriculture, Weather Bureau"
The transfer Of this Bureau from the
War Department to the Department. of
Agriculture, and the change OF name
from "Signal Service" to "Weather Bu-
reau" took place on July /. 1891, and
thus all in day flve hundred weather
prophets lost the plumes and tinsil Of a
soldier and became memb bers Of the great
army Of agriculturists. Figuratively
speaking they "beat their knives into
pruning hooks and their swords into
plowshares.
Since the weather has been turned
over to the Department of Agriculture
o little review Of the old Signal Corps
may not be out of place. The Signal
Corps as military organization was
first suggested prior to the civil war, by
Gen. A. j. Myer, an officer OF the United
States Army, and at that time connected
with the Surgeon Generals Office. The
difficulty of communicating with the
various divisions of an army, especially
during an engagement and when the ex-
igencies of the case required an order
be sent with the utmost safety and dis
patch, occasioned serious embarrassment
at times, and turned the attention of
military men to the invention of some
method that would overcome the diff
Guilty, and the result gave birth to the
Signal Corps, which has since obtained.
Gen. Myers plan was to adopt certain
principles Of telegraphy, as the dots and
dashes, to represent the letters of the
alphabet, using flags, which were waved
to the right to represent dot and to
the left to represent dash. BY this
means it was found perfectly practical
Bile, in ordinary atmosphere, to commu-
nicate readily at distance of ten miles,
during the day, and equally satisfactory
results were obtained by the use of
torches or colored lights at night.
Since Gen. Myers time much i'm
provement has been made on this sys-
tenn by the invention of the heliograph
and electric light. The heliograph Is
an instrument the principle OF which is
to communicate by the reflection of sun
light from properly arranged mirrors,
and has long been in use Ly the Amer
lean Indians, however in very crude
form, and during tho Apache campaign
in 1885 was used by the United States
Signal Corps successfully at distance
Of 1875 miles.
At the termination of the civil war the
system Of communicating by the use of
signals had attained very high degree
of perfection, It's value universally v
recognized and its future assured with
improved results. 1t was at this time
that the work of making daily weather
reports, which has become such prom
inent feature of the service, and which
has proved SO valuable to the public in
warning them against possible danger
from storm visitations, was placed in
charge of the Department This latter
phase was introduced by Prot. G. A.
Abbie, in 1868, and the results given to
the Cincinnati Merchants Exchange
and various other similar organizations.
His professional labors in this direction
met with SO much favor and commenda.
tion from the commercial associations
throughout the country that it led to
the presentation of memorial to Con-
gress embodying his views and praying
the support of the general government
for the enlargement of the system.
The necessary enactment and appropria.
tion was made and the first daily reports
were promulgated, by telegraph, on
November g. 1870.
Since the introduction of the work of
making these weather reports that
branch of the service has steadily grown
and expanded almost to the exclusion OF
its original military character, volumns
OF climatic history have been gathered,
thousands Of dollars worth OF property
have been saved, and it is now looked
upon and acknowledged to be one OF the
great and indispensable branches OF
governmental service. In the State OF
Wisconsin alone, on August oath of this
year, $l25,0oo representing about one
third OF the cranberry crop of that
State, was saved by prediction of q
killing frost. =.
The transfer of the meteorological
portion of the Signal Corps to a civil
department has long been under discus
sion, and was the natural result of q
complete change in the character of its
work from that which it was originally
intended to perform. 1t has grown from,
military and mechanical to purely
scientific organization and the laws and
limitations of the War Departmen were
found to hamper and retard It's progress.
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