The Introduction of Self-Registering Meteorological Instruments Part 2

[1] On early meteorological instruments see A. Wolf, _A History of Science, Technology and Philosophy in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries_, New York, 1935, and E. Gerland and F. Traumuller, _Geschichte der physikalischen Experimentierkunst_, Leipzig, 1899. On the recognition of the meteorological significance of the barometer by Torricelli and its meteorological use in 1649 see K. Schneider-Carius, _Wetterkunde Wetterforschung_, Freiburg and Munich, 1955, pp. 62, 71.

[2] Bacon's book emphasizes "direct" and "indirect" experiments, and calls for the systematization of observation, but it does not mention instruments. It is reprinted in Basil Montagu's _The Works of Francis Bacon, Lord Chancellor of England,_ London, 1825, vols. 10 and 14.

[3] Wolf, _op. cit._ (footnote 1), pp. 312, 316-320. The interest of the Royal Society in the barometer seems to have been initiated by Descartes' theory that the instrument's variation was caused by the pressure of the moon.

[4] _On early meteorology in the United States see the report of Joseph Henry in Report of the Commissioner of Patents, Agriculture, for the Year 1855_, 1856, p. 357ff.; also, _Army Meteorological Register for Twelve Years, 1843-1854_, 1855, introduction.

[5] J. D. Forbes, "Report upon the Recent Progress and Present State of Meteorology," _Report of the First and Second Meetings of the British a.s.sociation for the Advancement of Science, 1831 and 1832_, 1833, pp.

196-197.

[6] On the instruments used at Mannheim see Gerland and Traumuller, _op.

cit._ footnote 1, p. 349ff. The Princeton physicist Arnold Guyot prepared a set of instructions for observers that was published in _Tenth Annual Report ... of the Smithsonian Inst.i.tution_, 1856, p.

215ff. It appears from the _Annual Report of the British a.s.sociation for the Advance of Science_ in the 1830's that the instruments used in England were nearly the same as those later adopted by the Smithsonian, although British observatories were beginning to experiment with the self-registering anemometer at that time. A typical set of the Smithsonian instruments is shown in figure 1.

[7] H. Alan Lloyd, "Horology and Meteorology," _Journal Suisse d'Horlogerie_, November-December, 1953, nos. 11, 12, p. 372, fig. 1.

[8] R. T. Gunther, _Early Science in Oxford_, vol. 6, _The Life and Work of Robert Hooke_, pt. 1, Oxford, 1930, p. 196. In 1670, Hooke's proposed clock was referred to as "such a one, as Dr. Wren had formerly contrived" (Gunther, p. 365).

[9] William Derham, _Philosophical Experiments and Observations of ...

Dr. Robert Hooke_, London, 1726, pp. 41-42 (reprinted in Gunther, _op.

cit._ footnote 8, vol. 7, pp. 519-520). This description, dated December 5, 1678, predates the Royal Society's request for a description (Gunther, _op. cit._ footnote 8, p. 656) by four months, but the Society no longer has any description of the clock. As to the actual completion of the clock, the president of the Society visited "Mr. Hooke's turret"

to see it in January of 1678/79 but it was not reported "ready to be shown" until the following May (Gunther, pp. 506, 518).

[10] Wren's clock and its wind vane and anemometer, thermometer, barometer, and rain gauge are described by T. Sprat, _The History of the Royal Society..._, London, 1667, pp. 312-313. On the balance-barometer, see also footnote 28, below, and figure 4.

[11] Since the above was written, additional information on this clock has been published by H. E. Hoff and L. A. Geddes, "Graphic Recording before Carl Ludwig: An Historical Summary," _Archives Internationales d'Histoire des Sciences_, 1959, vol. 12, pp. 1-25. Hoff and Geddes call attention to a report on the clock by Monconys, who saw the instrument in 1663 and published a brief description and crude sketch (Balthasar Monconys, _Les Voyages de Balthasar de Monconys; Doc.u.ments pour l'Histoire de la Science, avec une Introduction par M. Charles Henry_, Paris, 1887). Monconys says that the thermometer "causes a tablet to rise and fall while a pencil bears against it." The instrument shown in his sketch resembles a Galilean thermoscope.

[12] Hooke's "oat-beard hygrometer" was described in 1667, but Torricelli seems to have invented the same thing in 1646, according to E. Gerland, "Historical Sketch of Instrumental Meteorology," in "Report of the International Meteorological Congress Held at Chicago, Ill., August 21-24, 1893," O. L. Fa.s.sig, ed., _U.S. Weather Bureau Bulletin No. 11_, pt. 3, 1896, pp. 687-699.

[13] But a Dutch patent was awarded to one William Douglas in 1627 for the determination of wind pressure (G. Doorman, _Patents for Inventions in the Netherlands during the 16th, 17th and 18th Centuries_, The Hague, 1942, p. 127), and Leonardo da Vinci left a sketch of both a wind pressure meter and a hygrometer (_Codex Atlanticus_, 249 va and 8 vb).

[14] Gunther, _op. cit._ (footnote 8), pp. 433, 502.

[15] Battista della Valle, _Vallo Libro Continente Appertiniente ad Capitanii, Retenere and Fortificare una Citta..._, Venetia, 1523 (reported under the date 1524 in G. H. Baillie, _Clocks and Watches, an Historical Bibliography_, London, 1951).

[16] Dolland's instrument, called an "atmospheric recorder," is described in the _Official, Descriptive and Ill.u.s.trated Catalogue to the Great Exhibition, 1851,_ London, 1851, pt. 2, pp. 414-415. As the George Dolland who joined the famous Dolland firm in 1804 would have been about 80 years of age in 1850, the George Dolland who exhibited this instrument may have been a younger relative.

[17] The Osler anemometer and most of the other self-registering instruments mentioned in this paper are described and ill.u.s.trated in C.

Abbe, "Treatise on Meteorological Apparatus and Methods," _Annual Report of the Chief Signal Officer for 1887_, Was.h.i.+ngton, 1888. The use of the Osler instrument at the British a.s.sociation's observatory at Plymouth is mentioned in the a.s.sociation's annual reports from 1838. There were a number of earlier self-registering anemometers, but no evidence of their extended use. See J. K. Laughton, "Historical Sketch of Anemometry and Anemometers," _Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society_, 1882, vol. 8, pp. 161-188.

[18] On Ronalds' work see reports of the British a.s.sociation for the Advancement of Science, from 1846 to 1850. On Brooke's work see _Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London_, 1847, vol.

137, pp. 59-68.

[19] C. Abbe, "The Meteorological Work of the U.S. Signal Service, 1870 to 1871," in Fa.s.sig, _op. cit._ (footnote 12), pt. 2, 1895, p. 263.

[20] _Annual Report of the Director of the Meteorological Observatory_, Central Park, New York, 1871, p. 1ff.

[21] _Oesterreichische Gesellschaft fur Meteorologie, Zeitschrift_, 1871, vol. 6, pp. 104, 117.

[22] P. H. Carl, _Repertorium fur physikalische Technik_, Munich, 1867, p. 162ff.

[23] E. Lacroix, _etudes sur l'Exposition de 1867_, Paris, 1867, vol. 2, p. 313ff. See also, Reports of the U.S. Commissioners to the Paris Universal Exposition, 1867, vol. 3, Was.h.i.+ngton, 1870, p. 570ff.

[24] _Annals of the Dudley Observatory_, 1871, vol. 2, p. vii ff.

[25] Karl Kreil, _Entwurf eines meteorologischen Beobachtungs-Systems fur die osterreichische Monarchie_, Vienna, 1850.

[26] _Report of the 13th Meeting of the British a.s.sociation for the Advancement of Science_, 1843, 1844, p. xi ff. I have found no other reference to this instrument. Considerable attention was given to the thermometer, however, for Wheatstone proposed to send it aloft in a balloon for the measurement of temperatures at high alt.i.tudes. A small clock caused a vertical rack to ascend and descend once in six minutes.

The rack carried a platinum wire which moved within the thermometer over 28 degrees. From a galvanic battery and a galvanometer on the ground two insulated copper wires were to extend to the balloon, one connected to the mercury and the other to the clock frame. The deflection of the galvanometer was to be timed with a second clock on the ground.

(Professor Wheatstone, "Report on the Electro-Magnetic Meteorological Register," _Mechanics' Magazine_, London, 1843, vol. 39, p. 204).

[27] In 1662 Hooke had proposed the use of a bimetallic pendulum for the temperature compensation of clocks. Thermometers on this principle were described to the Royal Society in 1748 and in 1760 (_Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London_, 1748, vol. 45, p. 128; 1760, vol. 51, p. 823). Some systems used a bimetallic thermometer in the sun and a mercurial instrument in the shade.

[28] This instrument has been persistently a.s.sociated with Sir Samuel Morland (1625-1695). For example, A. Sprung of the Deutsche Seewarte described his own balance-barometer as a "Wagebarograph nach Samuel Morland" (in L. Loewenherz, _Bericht uber die wissenschaftlichen Instrumente auf der Berliner Gewerbeausstellung im Jahre 1879_, Berlin, 1880, p. 230ff). Sprat (_op. cit._ footnote 10, p. 313) reported that Wren had proposed "balances to shew the weight of the air by their spontaneous inclination." This must, therefore, be Wren's invention, unless he got it from Morland, who does not seem to have published anything about the barometer but only to have described some ideas to a friend. But Morland's was probably the _inclined_ and not the _balance_ barometer. (See under "barometer" in Charles Hutton, _Mathematical and Philosophical Dictionary_, London, 1796, vol. 1; also J. K. Fischer, _Physikalisches Worterbuch, Gottingen_, 1798).

[29] Leibniz, in several letters--beginning with one to Denys Papin on June 21, 1697--proposed the making of a barometer on the model of a bellows. Of subsequent versions of such a barometer, that of Vidi (described by Poggendorff, _Annalen der Physik und Chemie_, 1848, Band 73, p. 620) is generally regarded as the first practical aneroid (see also Gerland and Traumuller, _op. cit._ footnote 1, pp. 239, 323).

[30] T. R. Robinson, "Modification of Dr. Whewell's Anemometer for Measuring the Velocity of the Wind," _Report of the 16th Meeting of the British a.s.sociation for the Advancement of Science, 1846_, 1847, pt. 2, p. 111.

[31] Abbe, _op. cit._ (footnote 19), pp. 263-264.

[32] Because of its superior accuracy to the aneroid barograph, Marvin's barometer was in use through the 1940's. See R. N. Covert, "Meteorological Instruments and Apparatus Employed by the United States Weather Bureau," _Journal of the Optical Society of America_, 1925, vol.

10, p. 322.

[33] Both of Richard's instruments (described in _Bulletin Mensuel de la Societe d'Encouragement pour l'Industrie Nationale_, November 1882, ser.

3, vol. 9, pp. 531-543) were in use at Kew by 1885 and at the U.S.

Weather Bureau by 1888. The firm of Richard Freres claimed in 1889 to have made 7,000 registering instruments, of which the majority were probably thermographs and barographs. At that time, certainly no other maker had made more than a small fraction of this number of self-registering instruments. The origin of Richard's thermograph seems to have been the "elastic manometer" described by E. Bourdon in 1851 (_Bulletin de la Societe d'Encouragement pour l'Industrie Nationale_, 1851, no. 562, p. 197). While attempting to restore a flattened still-pipe, Bourdon had discovered the property of tubes to change shape under fluid pressure. The instrument he developed in consequence became the standard steam pressure gauge.

[34] A few of these instruments, such as the Marvin barograph, survived for some time because of their superior accuracy. Even as museum pieces, only a few exist today.