Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1909-01-18
IS OUR CLIMATE CHANGING?
Records Show the Similarity Of Sea-
sons Planetary Changes Slow in
Progress.

1t is remarkable how memory eXag-
geratcs the events of our youth For
this reason elderly people have always
insisted and probably always will in
sist that the winters now are weak and
colorless compared to those of fifty
years ago, when the snow fell on
Thanksgiving day and lasted till the
first of March and "the ponds were
solid ice to the bottom and the Sound
was frozen from shore to shore AS
there are no records to prove their as
sertions, they are positive Of their
facts, and respect for age and dispo-
sition to believe that the present is
rather a commonplace period compared
with past centuries, prevents younger
people from contradicting them
AS FAR back as accurate records have
been kept the climate of the northern
hemisphere has not changed. From
1872 to 1907 the mean average winter
temperature of the city of New York
has ranged from 40.7 degrees in 1890 to
264 in 1904. There have been cold WIN
tiers and comparatively warm winters,
but the average of the first three years
of the period is precisely the same as
that of the last three-31 degrees. The
cold winters are sprinkled in at random
and 90 not become more numerous or
severe as time goes on They are evil
IDENTIFY due to local and temporary
causes, probably to the direction and
force of the winds or the shifting of the
currents of the ocean, which last, in
deed, are affected by the winds. For
"a years, from 1854 to 1878, the mean
winter temperature of eight Of our
principal cities was almost exactly the
same as that of the next "a years. The
later period gives an everage only ,O15
of degree higher, gain too small to
be beyond the possibility of an error
1t would seem, then, that our winters
are not growing colder.
This is what might be expected from
the fact that the northern hemisphere
receives the same amount Of heat
from the sun every year, because it's
average distance is the same. If the
sun is cooling down the rate is so slow
that many thousand years must pass
before the loss of heat from the great
life-giving source is perceptible. AS
rule the great changes in the physical
universe are very deliberate, and, like
the tides, move first in one direction
Arctic regions once enjoyed temper
ate climate and that Connecticut was
once covered with an ice sheet like
Greenland Astronomers and biologists
are divided as to how many millions
of years ago these climatic changes
took place The orbit of the earth is
elliptic, so that we are now some three
million, miles nearer the sun in winter
than we are in summer. The preces-
sion of the equinoxes will bring it
about in time that the earth is farther
from the sun in winter than in summer
AS orr planet moves faster the nearer
it is to the sun, the result will be
short, hot summers and long, Geld win
ters. The amount of heat received by
the earth in year will be the same,
but the effect will be very different. for
there will not be time enough to melt
the winter ice, which will slowly gain,
until we have another glacial age in
the northern hemisphere. At the same
time the Antarctic continent will be
freed from it's ice cap by the long sum-
| mer and become the seat of civilza-
ton Our climate will change in a
million or so years, but at present it
is fairly stable on the average.-Hart-
ford Times.