Omaha daily bee., 1897-07-24
A MIGHTY HOT TOWN.
Geographical Conditions which Give
Yuma ~IncnNinhIc Enmc.

Yuma tnenNinblc Fnmc.
Ever since old Fort Yuma was established
in 1850, writes a correspondent of the Globe
Democrat. the temperature of Yuma has been
proverbial. All the jokes and funny storieo
about high records have been credited to
Yuma for over forty years. That ancient,
palsied, and weather-beaten story about the
soldier who lived and died in the garrison
at Yuma, and whose ghost came back one
| night for his army blankets for use down in
chilly, frosty hell has gone everywhere, and
in its travels throughout the world has
given a certain fame to the town. Two gen.
e~rations OF American school children have
been taught that Yuma, noted for its high
temperature, is situated on the eaotern
bank of the Colorado river and on the west
ern edge of the Arizona desert Newspaper
| photographers and humorists have found the
summer temperature records of Yuma a
perennial and fruitful field for Their talents.
There is abundant reason why Yuma is the
banner hot town in the country. 1t is hot
from the very nature of things. The town is
in a sort of valley where Old Sol has all the
advantage. 1t lies on the east bank of the
Colorado river, which meanders through the
desert sands and adobe soil down to the
Gulf of California. Away to the west, across
the river and to the south stretches the
Colorado desert, several thousand square
miles in area. 1t is so merciless, ghostly and
fierce a desert waste that few dare to cross
it by wagon or on foot in the summer months
and in the winter OF early spring travellers
are careful to be accompanied by a companion
or two and supplied with an abundance of
drinking water and food. Every summer
venturesome miners lose their lives in trying
to cross the desert by being overtaken by q
sandstone or weakened unto death by the
dreadful heat. To the north there are vast
plains and uplands of barren, sun-baked
adobe soil and a peculiar formation of lava
and soft granite, the remains of numerous
extinct volcanoes. This area absorbs the
suns heat by day and distributes it by
night. To the east are millions of acres that
are the next thing to an absolute desert,
where nothing grows except by irrigation.
and then only scantily; where no one lives
who can exist elsewhere. For over 100 miles
about Yuma not a tree grows naturally, and
none of the forest trees that the people of
New England or the middle states know can
be grown even artificially. There is not a
thing in nature anywhere in the region to
add a degree of GOODNESS to the atmosphere.
There are no balmy breezes from anywhere,
no sea or lake air to come once in a while
as a relief after hours of a steady down
pouring of solar heat; not a mountain CT
brook, a canyon or dell, a grove or beach.
throughout a whole country, to which one
may resort for so much as a moment of
coolness. One may gaze in any direction
from the highest place in Yuma. and the
only color in nature to be seen is a dull
reddlsh-brown under a blazing sky. Even
the sluggish river takes ON the hue of the
surrounding territory.
NO one can tell adequately how the fierce
midsummer heat Of this part of Arizona
afects a person recently from the eastern
States-especially from the cool New Eng
iand and middle states. On most summer
Jays there is scarcely a breath of air stir
rins anywhere, and from early dawn until
sunset there Is constant sunshine. At s
a. m. the mercury on a warm day is 81 do
grees or 80 degrees. At 7 it has risen ia
81 degrees, at 10 it is 103 degrees, at l
?. m. 1t is at 107 degrees and at 8 D. m.
1t may be at 112 degrees; at G n m + has
gone down to 1O2 degrees. and at midnight
1t has sunk to 50 degrees. When a wind
comes up from off the desert the air is
almost shriveling, and even the natives of
yuma go into their adobe houses and shut
me uoorS TO avoid the air that comes like
that from the furnace room of a foundrv
me glare or the sunshine has serious eff
rect on the eyes. Green goggles and smoked
glasses are commonly worn here by eastern
people. Ihere are many cases of blindness
among United States soldiers who have been
stationed at forts in this region. The fierce
sunshine causes Inflammation of the ewes.
EVERY one does as much work as possible
IN the evening or early morning before the
sun has got in it's best efforts, and there
is little or no unnecessary movement about
town at midday. To show how hot the at
mosphere there really is, it may be men
toned that the writer has seen mining and
civil engineers carry bits of carpet to lay
under their feet while at work to keep the
sun-baked adobe from clustering their soles.
Children would not think of walking barefoot
on the sun-baked earth at MONDAY. Rail-
road brakemen wear leather mittens so that
they can handle coupling pins and links. The
china and glassware in the homes and at the
little hotel are as warm on any day in sum
mer as If they had just come out of very
warm water, and window panes are unbear-
ably hot. When one puts his hands on a
wall in a house on a hot day it feels like the
walls that surround a baker oven. All
horses and cows are kept here under roofs
Is ranging high. Vegetables, such as pota-
toes, rot in two days in such a high tenn
perature, and milk sours in an hour.