The Montgomery advertiser., 1907-02-12
CLIMATE NOT CHANGING.
Weather Rec0llectiOns UntrustwOrthy
 Western DrOuth Likely. Wa shin nrfnn Snacial fn New YOrk Fri

Weather Rec0lIections UntrustwOrthy.
 Western DrOuth Likely.
 Washington Special to New York Tri-
 Professor Willis L. Moore, chief of the weather bureau, Is rejoicing hat the country has been swept by a bliz- gard dring the last few days, for the reason that he believes that 1t is the only way to convince the people of the error in the idea that the winters are becoming milder and the climate is changing. He sees financial ruin to many as a result of entertaining these conceptions. so nothing sui. s him bet ter than to have experience give dreamers some pointed lessons.
 "Why, the blizzard of 1888" Profess sor Moore will say in his meditations; when you get old enough you will be telling your boys that that occurred every winter when you were young : s.er and that the weather is not what it used to be-
 Shortly after Adam ana Eve began to take interest in affairs arose the story about the climate growing milder. the professor believes. Iffe is able to trace back this weakness in perception and memory to Thomas Jefferson. and Professor Moore has such confidence in Jefferson that he regards hffA as a typical of human nature through the centuries past. The chief of the wealth CT bureau points out in papers at the S.ate department where Jefferson wrote: Tt is apparent that the cli- mate of Virginia Is changed. The old inhabitants here tell me that they re, member when snow lay on the ground four months every year and they rode in sleighs. Now 1t is rare that we get enough snow to have sleigh ride It is apparent that the climate of Vir- ginia has changed since 1907, when the settlers came into jamestown"
 There has been great deal of clear ing in the thickly wooNed country Of Virginia since 16O7,'' ven-ured Profes- sor Moore, "but, really, that would not change it. The change was in the men who were telling the story. We meas ure things by a different standard as we grow older. Every man when he back and think of one great snow storm. and he will say: We had snow four feet deep all winter long,, be- cause all the remembers as he thinks back Is one snow storm. He remem- bers the abnormal, and in his mind brings it down to the present day and compares 1t with the average But 1t is not fair comparison"
 Along this line Professor Moore pre- diets that this country Is due for a long period of drouth. The present long period of abundant rainfall over the great cereal plains, abou: six years, is the longest of which the weather bureau has any records Professor Moore is certain that there will be a shortage in rainfall soon equal in amount to the excess during the last SIX years. HIS lb UdoCV Oll -lC AC@ cords of the bureau, which show that the average rainfall during the first ten years of a period of thirty. forty or fifty years is precisely the same as he average of the last ten. Many per- sons write to the bureau, saying that they have been advised to buy land in a region formerly classed as arid. It Is offered for sale to them on the ground that there has been a perma- nent change in the clima.e. Invaria- blv Professor Moore answers that the climate has not changed,
 Professor Moore points out that the country does not need as much rain as 1t did formerly to make the land productive. The virgin soil is being broken up and trees are being planted. While this does not increase the rain- fall. as Is sometimes stated, it makes inc same amount more efficient and more profitable because the soil is broken up and there will not be so much to run off. There is not so much evaporation, the ground absorbing it more thoroughly.