The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1901-01-13
a KITE-FLYING RECORD
SCIENTIFIC EXPERIMENTS AT BLUE
HILL OBSERVATORY.
Adapting Methods of Deep-Sea sound
ing for Sounding the Air-work
in Connection with Harvard.

BOSTON. Jan. 12-The Blue Hills, ten
miles to the south Of Boston. comprise the
highest elevation of land on the Atlantic
coast between Maine and Florida. The
highest point in the range. the Great Blue
Hill. so called. is 6S5 feet above the level
Of the sea. The range is prominent in the
landscape for miles around. The Indians
called it Massachusetts. 1.-The Great Hills
whence came the name. originally given by
Capt John Smith. of Massachusetts Bay
itself, and afterwards of the colony. prov
ince and State of Massachusetts. IT IS now
a part OF the great metropolitan park sys-
TEN Of Boston, in which it forms the larg-
est, and, in many respects. most interest
ing link. including some 400 acres of pic
turesque. constantly varying woodland and
hill. matched only, if at all, by the great
seashore park at Revere Beach.
Here. on the summit Of the Great Blue"
IS the Blue Hill Meteorological Observa-
tory. maintained by Mr.. A. Lawrence
Rotch. Of this city, as a station of the as
Economical observatory OF Harvard Univer-
sity. 1t was founded privately in 1885 by
Mr.. Rotch. and since then it has been sup
ported entirely from his private means at a
LDLdt GOSL Va utdI4g SlVv,UOJ, Dul III 1879 IL
was transferred. by a lease of the land on
which it stands, TO the general care of the
Harvard astronomical department. in the
publications of which the records of its in
vestigatiOns since 1887 form a part or the
whole OF four large volumes, making an
interesting counterpart TO the records of
the lofty mountain meteorological stations
maintained by the Harvard Observatory in
-
tinues as before, with the continuance also
Of his own personal staff-including at the
present time Mr.. II. Helm Clayton, meteo-
~rologist; Mr.. S. p. Ferguson, mechanician
Gan important position in an observatory,
where novel experiments call constantly
for new and specially devised apparatus),
and Mr.. A. E. Sweetland, observer.
TO STUDY THE AIR.
The work of the Blue Hill Observatory
has been notable and interesting in many
ways. With the exception of the munic-
ipal observatory in New York, it was the
first in the country to be equipped with
Instruments which recorded graphically and
continuously all the meteorological ele-
ments-except the form and motion of
Enthusiastically observed at a station of
the first order. Commencing with 1886,
hourly values as indicated by these in
were printed for the year. The
secondary stations, like the main observa-
tory equipped with self-recOrding instru-
ments, have been maintained, almost from
the beginning, lower down on the bill and
in the valley, at attitudes respectively of
fifty and two hundred feet above the sea
level. And for many years the observatory
has carried on a special study of the vari-
Gus forms of clouds. The first series of
measurements in America OF the height
and velocity of clouds. by t-rigonometrical
and other methods, was made here in
1S9O-91. and the measurements were re-
peated six years later as a part Of an
international system.
But to the popular imagination the most
interesting thing done at Blue hill is the
kite fying-the exploration of the free air,
as il is more scientifically called. by means
of self-recording instruments attached to
kites. In this the Blue Hill Observatory
was the pioneer. and its methods have been
widely adopted for meteorological observa-
ton. Kites have been used for many years,
10 be sure. for scientific purposes, as every
one who recalls Franklin's famous experi-
ment will know. In 1749. three years before
that celebrated fight. however, two Scot
fish scientists had raised thermometers
into the clouds by the same means. During
the first part OF the nineteenth century,
the same use OF kites for ascertaining the
temperature in the free air was made by
various European investigators, and in 1910,
Espy. I'm this country, employed kites to
verify his calculations OF the height Of
clouds.
BEGUN IN ENGLAND.
Modern kite flying for scientific purposes
more properly dates. perhaps. from 1883.
when Douglas archibald. in England. fas-
tened to the kite wire thermometers. which
registered total-as distinguished from con-
tinuOusly re~corded-wind movements. and
so obtained different measures of the wind
velocity at heights up to 100 feet. On Blue
kill itself. in 1885. Mr.. Alexander McAdle,
now OF the Weather Bureau, repeated
Franklin's electrical experiment. using.
however, instead of Franklin's primitive
key, the modern eIectrometer. and in 1891
and in 1892 he measured simultaneously the
electrical potential at the base of Blu hill,
on the hill. and with kites as collectors
several hundred feet above the hill top.
About the same time a German CWeber)
made a more extensive use of kites to col
lect the atmospheric electricity.
But the man who is naturally thought
of as the person who really popularized
the scientific use of kites is Mr.. William
n Eddy. OF Bayonne, n. ]. He introduced
the novel form which took the place. for
scientists. OF the common kite of child
hood. and was perhaps the first TO suggest
the use of kites to obtain data for forecast
ing the weather. In August. 1894. Mr.. Eddy,
at the invitation of Mr.. Rotch. brought
his kites-which he was then flying tan
dem for the sake of greater steadiness
and pOwer-to Blue hill, and with them
lifted a thermograph. which was partly
reconstructed of aluminium, so that IL
weighed only two and a quarter pounds.
10 the height of 1900 feet where the
earliest automatic record Of temperature
was obtained by means of a kite. Next
summer Mr.. Eddy was back again in
Boston 10 assist in further experiments
at the Blue Hill Observatory. and at this
time secured from his kites a number of
the "bird's-eye'' photographs which have
since become so we'll known.
II d. Ls- IL Al