Albert J . Myer Albert James Myer ( September 20 , 1828 – August 24 , 1880 ) was a surgeon and United States Army officer . He is known as the father of the U . S . Army Signal Corps , as its first chief signal officer just prior to the American Civil War , the inventor of " wig - wag " signaling ( or " aerial telegraphy " ) , and also as the father of the U . S . Weather Bureau . Early life . Myer was born in Newburgh , New York , son of Henry Beekman Myer and Eleanor McClanahan Myer . The family moved to Western New York and after the death of his mother in 1834 , he was raised primarily by his aunt in Buffalo . He worked as a telegrapher before entering Geneva College ( now Hobart College ) in Geneva , New York , in 1842 , at age 13 , and from where he was graduated in 1847 as a member of The Kappa Alpha Society . He received his M . D . degree from Buffalo Medical College in 1851 , while working part - time for the New York State Telegraph Company . His doctoral thesis , " A New Sign Language for Deaf Mutes " , showed concepts that he later used for his invention of aerial telegraphy . Although he inherited a large fortune from his family , he was ambitious and intellectually curious . It was said " that he was specially noted for the manner in which he would take hold of an idea or principle , and , following it to its length and breadth , develop all there was in it or of it . " He engaged in private medical practice in Florida and then sought a commission as a U . S . Army assistant surgeon ( lieutenant ) , entering service September 18 , 1854 , posted at Fort Duncan , Texas , and Fort Davis , Jeff Davis County , Texas . His major interest of the time , besides medicine , was to devise a system of signaling across long distances , using simple codes and lightweight materials . This system of codes using a single signal flag ( or a lantern or kerosene torch at night ) , known as " wig - wag " signaling or " aerial telegraphy " , would be adopted and used by both sides in the Civil War and afterward . In 1858 , the Army expressed interest in Myer ' s invention and appointed a board to examine " the principles and plans of the signalling , mode of use in the field , and course to be pursued in introducing to the army . " Myer appeared before the board , chaired by Lt . Col . Robert E . Lee , in 1859 and convinced them to authorize field testing of his invention . He conducted field tests starting in April of that year around New York Harbor . The tests were successful and Secretary of War John B . Floyd recommended to Congress that the Army adopt Myer ' s system and that Myer be appointed as chief signal officer . Congress approved Myer ' s appointment as major and chief signal officer and the Signal Corps was formed , despite opposition in the Senate by Jefferson Davis from Mississippi . Myer was sent to the Department of New Mexico for further field trials of his system in a campaign against the Navajos . On August 24 , 1857 , he married Catherine Walden , daughter of a prominent Buffalo attorney , with whom he would have six children . Signal Corps and the Civil War . The June 21 , 1860 , letter from the War Department that ordered Myer to organize and command the new U . S . Army Signal Corps provided little of substance . It authorized $ 2000 for equipment and a promotion for Myer to major , effective June 27 . Myer was faced with the responsibility of recruiting subordinates who could be detailed from elsewhere in the Army . The Signal Corps would not commence as an official Army organization until March 3 , 1863 , at which time Myer was promoted to colonel . Between these two dates , Myer served first under Maj . Gen . Benjamin Butler at Fort Monroe , Virginia , where he established a camp of instruction , and then as the chief signal officer for Maj . Gen . George B . McClellan ' s Army of the Potomac in its campaigns from the Peninsula Campaign to the Battle of Antietam . During this period Myer was awarded a brevet promotion to lieutenant colonel in the regular army for his actions at Hanover Court House , and to brevet colonel for Malvern Hill . Ironically , the first use in combat of Myer ' s signaling system was by Confederate Captain Edward Porter Alexander at the First Battle of Bull Run . Alexander had been a subordinate of Myer ' s and assisted in the New York field trials . In addition to his aerial signaling , Myer recognized the need for electrical telegraphy in field communications . He introduced a field telegraph train of wagons to support a device called the Beardslee telegraph , which used a dial instead of a key tapping Morse code , developed to require less training for its operators . Myer ' s Signal Corps was actually a separate entity from the Military Telegraph Service , a War Department bureau staffed primarily by civilian telegraph operators . He had numerous organizational disputes with the assistant secretary of war for this function , attempting on several occasions to take control of all telegraphic operations . When he proposed to remove the less than dependable Beardslee device and recruit training telegraphers into the Signal Corps , Secretary of War Edwin M . Stanton removed him from his post as chief signal officer on November 15 , 1863 , and reassigned him out of Washington , D . C . , effectively exiling him . While conducting routine reconnaissance of the Mississippi River from Cairo , Illinois , to Memphis , Tennessee , Myer wrote the " Manual of Signals for the United States Army and Navy " . In June 1864 , he was appointed by Maj . Gen . E . R . S . Canby to be the signal officer of the Military Division of West Mississippi . Under Canby , Myer added a new duty to the tasks of the Signal Corps by working out a system for interrogating deserters and refugees who came into the Union lines . He also developed a coding system for transmitting routine messages between land and sea forces . He organized communications plans for the operations in the Mobile area and participated , with U . S . Navy officers , in the surrender of Fort Gaines . He served as signal officer for the Department of the Gulf from August 1864 to 1865 . While he was preparing for the Mobile campaign , Myer received the disturbing news that his appointment as colonel and chief signal officer , which had been made before his dismissal in 1863 , had not been confirmed by the Senate and was revoked , thus returning him to his permanent rank of major . Through early 1865 , Myer employed lawyers and political connections to attempt to correct what he perceived as an injustice . On July 28 , 1866 , reacting to the influence of Lt . Gen . Ulysses S . Grant and President Andrew Johnson , Congress reorganized the Signal Corps and , with the permanent rank of colonel , Myer again became chief signal officer . He was particularly gratified when word of this victory came on October 30 , 1866 , as his old nemesis , Edwin Stanton , had to inform him of his reinstatement . He was not confirmed in the position until February 1867 and was not ordered to active duty until August 1867 . His new duties included control of the telegraph service , resolving the dispute that had removed him from his position . Myer received the brevet rank of brigadier general in honor of his formation of the Signal Corps , effective March 13 , 1865 . His commission as brigadier general in the regular Army came on June 16 , 1880 , two months before his death . As an Army officer , Myer was nicknamed " Old Probabilities " by his subordinates . Postbellum career . The U . S . Congress , on February 9 , 1870 , authorized " . . . meteorological observations at the military stations in the interior of the continent and at other points in the states and territories of the United States , and for giving notice on the northern lakes and seaboard by telegraph and signals of the approach and force of storms " . This duty , previously conducted by the Smithsonian Institution , was assigned to General Myer ' s Signal Corps , due in part to his previous interests in storm telegraphy . It was the birth of the U . S . Weather Bureau , now the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration . In 1873 at the International Meteorological Congress of Vienna , he proposed a resolution for the establishment throughout the world of weather stations and daily exchange of simultaneous weather observations , the effective beginning of the World Meteorological Organization . Myer was instrumental in the development of heliograph y in the U . S . Army . In 1877 , he acquired heliograph instruments from the British Army for experimental purposes and sent them on to General Nelson A . Miles , at the Yellowstone Department in Montana . Miles developed expertise with the heliograph , which he used to great purpose in the Arizona Apache campaigns . Myer headed the Signal Corps from August 21 , 1867 , until his death of nephritis at Buffalo , New York , in 1880 . He is interred in the Walden - Myer Mausoleum at Forest Lawn Cemetery in Buffalo . Legacy . Myer is honored by several entities : Fort Whipple , Virginia , was renamed Fort Myer in 1881 ; U . S . Navy ship ( formerly U . S . Army Ship ) , an undersea cable - laying vessel built in the 1950s ; the Albert J . Myer Center , the Signal Headquarters building of the U . S . Army Communication Electronics Command ( CECOM ) at Fort Monmouth , New Jersey ; and the General Albert J . Myer Forecast Facility at the Buffalo Niagara International Airport . Hobart College awarded Myer an honorary LL . D . degree in 1872 and Union College conferred an honorary Ph . D . on him in 1875 .