The Importance of Weather

Every day, Isaac B. Werner recorded the weather in his journal--the temperature, the rainfall, the condition of his crops.  As a farmer, he followed the markets, relying on trips to town or reports from neighbors, having no radio, television, or internet to check for the latest reports.  Neither did he have a local weather man or woman to advise him of projected changes in the weather nor NOAA to warn him of approaching severe weather.

What he did have, however, were folk sayings and a keen sense of observation with which to make his own weather predictions.  "Red sky in the morning, sailors take warning."  He learned the signs of his region and was constantly alert.  After seeing his first tornado, like a sock hanging down from the clouds, he became more watchful of cloud formations like the ones from which the sock-shape had developed, better understanding what had preceded the tornado that touched down and darkened with the dirt it carried upward as he watched. He consulted his journal entries to observe weather patterns from year to year, and bought the pamphlets containing not only weather predictions but also solar and lunar events.  He also corresponded with Professor Shelton at Kansas State College, Director of the first Experimental Station, and he subscribed to farming journals.

Today we have so many sources of information, and most important is the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, founded October 3, 1970 by President Richard Nixon within the Department of Commerce.  In the words of President Nixon, by bringing earlier scientific agencies within the government together, it would provide "better protection of life and property from natural hazards  ...for a better understanding of the total environment...[and] for exploration and development leading to the intelligent use of our marine resources."  The need for such information and intelligent use of resources was recognized early, and agencies to achieve those goals were among some of the oldest in our federal government, for example:  United States Coast and Geodetic Survey, 1807; Weather Bureau of the United States, 1870; Bureau of Commercial Fisheries (research fleet) 1871; Coast and Geodetic Survey Corps, 1917.   

The breadth of essential responsibilities under the umbrella of NOAA is remarkable and, I suspect, largely under appreciated by most of us.  At a cost of about $3 per person, the following services exist:  Weather Service; Ocean Service; Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service; Marine Fisheries Service; Oceanic and Atmospheric Research; Marine and Aviation Operations; Geodetic Survey; Integrated Drought Information System; NOAA Commissioned Corps; and Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Walt Whitman

Walt Whitman (1819-1892), who was living throughout Isaac Werner's entire life, wrote in his book Specimen Days under the heading 'Nature And Democracy--Mortality', "American Democracy, in its myriad personalities, in factories, work-shops, stores, offices--through the dense streets and houses of cities, and all their manifold sophisticated life--must either be fibred, vitalized, by regular contact with out-door light and air and growths, farm-scenes, animals, fields, trees, birds, sun-warmth and free skies, or it will morbidly dwindle and pale.  We cannot have grand races of mechanics, work people, and commonalty, (the only specific purpose of America,) on any less terms."  

During a very dry season, when farmers desperately needed rain, I was in the local Wal-Mart when a woman came running into the store, proclaiming loudly in disgust to everyone close enough to hear, "I just got my hair done and this rain is spoiling it."  The economy of our community is based almost entirely on agriculture and ranching, and whether this woman lived in town or not, her family's livelihood was probably dependent on farms and ranches surrounding the town.  Yet, she seemed unaware of the need for the rain she found so unwanted because it spoiled her freshly styled hair.

Whitman was right.  Isaac Werner and those early settlers knew the importance of those things under the umbrella of NOAA today, but those who have lived their lives in cities may forget how essential all of that is.  Perhaps even some of us who live in the country may fail to reflect on the importance of all the interconnected responsibilities "for a better understanding of the total environment" as described by President Nixon.  The flooding and wildfires may be making more Americans aware of that.

Remember, you can click on the images to enlarge them.

Isaac Sees First Tornado

When our careers took my husband and me away from Kansas, we quickly learned what many people's impression of our home state was. When they learned we had been born and raised in Kansas, they were likely to ask, "Have you ever seen a tornado?" Today, sport's fans might be more inclined to comment on Kansas University basketball or Kansas State University football, but the Wizard of Oz has definitely left the impression with many people that Kansas is the land of tornadoes.

In fact, I have never seen a tornado, and I hope I never do. Kansas is not even in the top three states with the most reported tornadoes, those being Oklahoma, Texas and Florida. Every state has a reported tornado on record, although for a few states, tornadoes are extremely rare. The Great Plains is frequently called 'Tornado Alley,' and the states in the Mid-West with the greatest number of tornadoes are Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, Iowa and South Dakota. During 2011 severe tornadoes struck states where that seemed an unexpected weather phenomena.

Isaac came to Kansas to stake his claim in 1878, yet it was a decade before he saw his first tornado. On May 9, 1888, he wrote in his journal,"Clouds gathering over S. of us and a 'Twister' down S.E., the first I seen, a tapering white sock hanging down, slanting from clouds and in a mere streak connecting down to ground raising the dust at time[s] then raising & vanishing & moving on down again & renewing the dark dust funnel." The tornado disappeared before coming near Isaac's homestead and timber claim, but the power and potential for destruction left a lingering impression with Isaac, for he later wrote,"One looks for 'Twisters' now at any cloud raising."

If Isaac had been living on his homestead in May of 2007, he would surely have seen the nest of tornadoes that hung from the clouds over three nights of destruction in his community. Homes were destroyed, lives were lost, and the small city of Greensburg about twenty-five miles to the southwest was nearly obliterated. Although Greensburg dominated the news reports, the rural area around my childhood home also suffered two deaths and severe property damage.

Tornadoes are certainly frightening, but they are also quirky in their destruction. Recently I took this photograph of two tree rows on opposite sides of a road. The edge of the 2007 tornado can be seen from the destruction of the tree belt on the east side of the road, while the tree belt on the west side was practically untouched. Devastation or survival may be the result of a distance of only a few feet. Many groves and rows of trees in our community are little more than mutilated remants of once stately shelter belts.

About a mile to the south of the tree rows, the home of our friends was destroyed, along with the farm equipment and the metal grain bins of their farming operation. Metal from those grain bins, and from the bins and metal buildings of other farms, was carried by the tornadoes for miles, driven into tree trunks and buried in fields to ruin tractor tires, unless sharp-eyed farmers spot the protruding metal. Perhaps the piece of heavy metal wrapped around the guywire of this pole to create a piece of nature's art from tragedy came from our friends' farm several miles to the south. The force of the whirling tornado bent the metal around the guywire like a sheet blowing on a clothes line.

The pasture posts topped with old boots extend in both directions for a quarter of a mile or so--just a bit of rural whimsy for passersby to enjoy.

May of 2008 also brought serious injuries and loss of property from tornadoes in our community. Although winter is the likely time for tornadoes in the South, it is spring when Kansans make sure the NOAA (National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration's weather alert) is plugged into an outlet and the storm shelter has been sprayed to get rid of spiders and is stocked with candles, matches, flashlights, blankets, and maybe a gallon of water and some packaged peanut butter crackers--just in case. It was May when Isaac saw his first tornado, and luckily for him, he never saw another.