Guest Post by Steven Goddard
January, 1790 was a remarkable year in the northeastern US for several reasons. It was less than one year into George Washington’s first term, and it was one of the warmest winter months on record. Fortunately for science, a diligent Philadelphia resident named Charles Pierce kept a detailed record of the monthly weather from 1790 through 1847, and his record is archived by Google Books. Below is his monthly report from that book.
JANUARY 1790 The average or medium temperature of this month was 44 degrees This is the mildest month of January on record. Fogs prevailed very much in the morning but a hot sun soon dispersed them and the mercury often ran up to 70 in the shade at mid day. Boys were often seen swimming in the Delaware and Schuylkill rivers. There were frequent showers as in April some of which were accompanied by thunder and lightning The uncommon mildness of the weather continued until the 7th of February.
Compare that to January, 2009 with an average temperature of 27F, 17 degrees cooler than 1790. One month of course is not indicative of the climate, so let us look at the 30 year period from 1790-1819 and compare that to the last 10 “hot” years.
According to several of the most widely quoted climate scientists in the world, winters were much colder 200 years ago than now – yet the boys swimming in the Delaware in January, 1790 apparently were unaware.
Another interesting fact which can be derived from Charles Pierce’s data, is that January temperatures cooled dramatically during the period 1790-1819 – as can be seen in the graph below. The cooling rate was 13F/century. What could have caused this cooling? We are told by some experts that variations in solar activity can only affect the earth’s temperature by a few tenths of a degree. CO2 levels had been rising since the start of the industrial age. The downward trend is fairly linear and does not show any sharp downward spikes, so it is unlikely to be due to volcanic activity. What other “natural variability” could have caused such a dramatic drop in temperature?
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A key point here is that January in Philadelphia during the “warmest decade in history” has been no warmer than January during the Dalton minimum – a known cold period.
Pamela Gray, forgive me for being the class clown, but there’s no way the jet stream could have affected anything back then, since jets were only invented in the 40s.
Thank you.
And yes, there WAS a point besides just trying to be funny. What wasn’t known then would fill libraries. What isn’t known now would too…
Evert Jesse:
Use Google to search on:
‘el nino tectonic modulation in the pacific basin’
My earlier post seems to have disappeared into electronic limbo, so here goes again:
Bill Illis: I’m certain that you would enjoy reading Dr. Tim Ball’s Phd thesis which was founded upon the temperature/climate data, for Hudson Bay trading post records, that he retrieved out of the Hudson Bay company archives, held in Winnipeg, Manitoba.
By the way, regarding jet stream and prevailing wind direction, click on the 30-day animation of Arctic Ice and watch the flow of ice concentration http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/. Then click on the jet stream Arctic loop http://squall.sfsu.edu/crws/jetstream.html. They don’t exactly coincide because the pictures are taken on different days and have longer in-between data blanks, but you will learn a LOT about sea ice behavior and wind direction. Too bad some enterprising web designer hasn’t made this a possibility. You could super-impose an animation of Arctic ocean currents (temp and speed), wind direction and speed from the jet stream to the inner patterns, air temperature, and sea ice behavior. Goes a long way in explaining Arctic sea ice behavior.
Which leads back to my point about weather patterns near Philly. A looped animation of weather fronts, jet stream behavior, oceanic currents (temp, etc) and land temperature would also go a long way in explaining weather patterns.
Leonard Hill of East Bridgewater. Mass. kept a daily weather diary from 1806 to 1869. It was published under the title Meteorological and Chronological Register.
Each day is given a brief description such as Feb 1, 1819: Very warm; clear sun; no frost 61F. Feb 1819 is interesting and the description for the month reads: Warmest February known for thirty years past; no snow since the 4th.
A few daily entries for that month:
Feb 10: Frogs noisy and snakes out thick.
Feb 11: Snakes seen every day for a week past; warm as May.
Feb 12: Hot as June; 71 F.
Feb 21: Frost out for six weeks past.
For March he says: Very warm winter since December.
For April: Month uncommonly warm
For May: Hot and dry.
For June: Very hot
For August: Very hot month; greatest temperature since 1800.
Mike McMillan (01:43:01) :
Mike, the one thing I noticed at the climatetrek link you provided was the typical spin. A notation that scientists were not saying due to global warming but consistent with it, El Nino a past factor but not a major one, etc. But… not one word about urbanization, land-use, etc.
I have to agree with your implied sentiment: A disingenuous characterization.
Here’s some intersting news form the Pew Research Center that shows global warming concerns waining in the public eye. Global warming ranks dead last on the “Top domestic Priorities for Obama”. I hope he gets the memo on his Blackberry.
Economy, Jobs Trump All Other Policy Priorities In 2009
Environment, Immigration, Health Care Slip Down the List
http://people-press.org/report/485/economy-top-policy-priority
Pamela,
Good point about the ocean oscillations. You might note that the PDO shift in 1977 looked more like a step function than a linear trend as we see in the graph above.
http://climate.gi.alaska.edu/ClimTrends/Change/graphics/temp_dep_49-07_F_sm.jpg
Pierre Gosselin (05:55:11) :
I meant hockey stick
Come, come Pierre, you were right the first time LOL.
DaveE.
One of the reasons there continues to be so much global warming still going around.
I’m not much of a statistician but couldn’t pass up a chance to provide requested feedback to NOAA concerning their Local Three Month Temperature Outlook. The product is relatively new (couple-several years) but seldom forecasts below normal temperatures. The reason becomes apparent when you look at the figures they use. My reply:
I was curious as to why there were few instances of forecast “below normal” temperatures with the product so I conducted a little exercise of my own using the summer (JJA) data for Bangor, Maine. Seems these products appear to be no more than an exercise in statistical manipulation. Rather than use the raw 1971-2000 average temperature, you’ve adopted the revised NOW data which drops the average 0.6F. As if that were not enough, you chose to use the “median” instead of the average. This drops the temperature another 0.6F for a total change of -1.2F for the season. This is precisely the value of a standard deviation for the ME-02 climate region. Using the raw average figures for the past 8 years I find that there is only one instance of the average exceeding a standard deviation, which would be 2004 with an average of -1.9F. Using your revised median figures for the eight years the results would be dramatically different: the median would be exceeded four times (50%) and fall within the standard deviation four times. Seems to me that all you have to forecast is “average to above” to see 100% verification. Like I said – an exercise in statistical manipulation!
Is this true? http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7841030.stm
Meat to be removed from hospital menus in NHS plan to cut carbon emissions.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1127527/Meat-removed-hospital-menus-NHS-plan-cut-carbon-emissions.html
What next.
Peter McWilliam (02:51:29) :
While reading stuff that led to my New England view of The Year without a Summer I concluded the key feature was the jet stream (and storm track) was displaced southward. Areas south of New England were not as impacted as we were. While the big stories here would have been the freezes in each month of the year, we had several days in the 80s (normal) and the apple crop was very good, so there wasn’t a freeze when they were flowering. (The good crop was also because the insect population had a disasterous season.)
I suspect the same thing happened in Europe, but haven’t looked into that.
I have no idea whether climate models would show a storm track displacement during volcanic aerosol events or reduction of irradience. It would be interesting to take a closer look at storm tracks throughout a PDO cycle (and AMO, ENSO, and others) instead of just temperature and droughts as we seem to do now.
In addition to historical documents such as old diaries and farmers’ records, there are naval logbooks, as mentioned here. Apparently some of these logs indicate a period of rapid warming in Europe during the 1730s; it would be interesting to see how this might tie in with the PDO/AMO at that time.
Pamela Gray (07:37:24) :
A couple that affect the northeast don’t have much of a wild west component.
“Backdoor cold fronts” are common in May and June and come in from north and northeast. They bring easterly wind from the chilling Atlantic. I think of them as seabreezes on steroids. A decent seabreeze makes it 10-15 miles inland, backdoor cold fronts can reach Vermont.
Nor’easters form off the SE Atlantic coast, generally triggered by a storm that makes it to the midwest before transferring its energy to the coast. They generally are associated with a big dip in the jetstream that pulls up warm, moist air from the Gulf of Mexico, and mixes it with cold Canadian air. The new storm intensifies over the Atlantic, “bombing out” if the conditions are good, and if we’re really lucky, stalling off the New England coast. I get daily hits on my Blizzard of ’78 page 30+ years after the event.
You can keep your Pineapple Express. I’ve been in a couple on week-long business trips to San Jose (40 year flooding one year). I’m not impressed (nor with how well most Californians drive in the rain!) The storms that train down from Alaska I have a bit more respect for, at least they bring snow in the hills around the Bay area.
Some more anecdotal weather from the AP:
Subzero temperatures spread across Maine
By The Associated Press
CARIBOU, Maine — Subzero temperatures were felt across Maine on Monday as another round of arctic air spread into the region.
According to the National Weather Service, the state’s coldest spot was Big Black River, an uninhabited spot in northwest Aroostook County that had a minus 46 reading at 6 a.m.
The weather service said Masardis came in at 44 below zero, Van Buren at minus 41, Presque Isle at minus 40 and Houlton at minus 36.
Bangor reached 25 below zero, Sanford hit minus 15 and Portland came in at minus 2.
Bangor set a record on Sunday with a minus-19 reading, breaking the old record for the date of minus 14 set in 1948.
The AP along with journalists in general, love to use the word “arctic” when it’s really Continental Polar.
This doesn’t show up in the data models, therefore, it never happened.
Just a reminder of what is going on in 2009 presently.
You see, when the Bush administration does it, it is called “denial” and “delay” and acting for political interests (who knew Detroit automakers’ labor unions voted Republican?). But when the Obama administration does it, it is being “guided by science and “acting on the facts” as well as to make us “independent of foreign oil” and so forth.
Because of course when you don’t drink the kool-aid of climate change, whatever you do to oppose the Vast Green-Alliance Conspiracy’s agenda is swiftly labled in the above terms as Bush was.
Here is latest on car tailpipe emissions:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28846202
More to the point of this posting:
Are we looking at 200-something year cycle here? If so, are there any details that we know from the last one (besides, of course, that it was cold)?
My apologies is if this has been asked/answered in comments. If so, please direct me. If not, does anyone have any answers? Leif maybe?
“AN APPROXIMATE SEVEN-YEAR PERIOD IN TERRESTRIAL WEATHER, WITH SOLAR CORRELATION” (” … The author presents data and curves for the United States showing the persistence of a period in weather averaging 7 years from 1×90 to 1919. …”)
Off topic: Effect of Beliefs About Weather Conditions on Tipping”
1975 study about cooling: “Weather Variability, Climatic Change, and Grain Production”
Whats interesting about Sunspots, is that they are an indirect indicator of solar activity, and it more likely is the amount of solar ion radiation that affects Earths climate.
One interesting fact that few people seem to connect (correlation or not) is that the last half of Dec 2006 saw some of the highest solar flare activity in a long time.
http://www.solen.info/solar/old_reports/2006/december/indices.html
Then January 2007 was the regarded as the hottest January on record.
Coincidence or connection?
From the Haddingtonshire Courier, 4th January 1901 :
“Those who watched for the first glimmer of the new century enjoyed a dawn that might almost have belonged to a backward May, so open and fresh and clear was it. New Year’s day was quite ideal for holidaying, albeit the roads were rather heavy. The country looked wonderfully green and ‘growing’ considering the season. Altogether, the first day of the new century was, as we have said, a good augury – and if auguries do no good at least they do no harm.”
Other reports mention the mild, almost unseasonal weather for that time.
This is purely anecdotal evidence, totally unsupported by bristlecone pine measurements or GCMs.
As usual, you denialists are clutching at straws!
REPLY: Mr. Linard, please don’t use that term, name calling is the lowest form of debate. – Anthony Watts
Pam,
I understand your point, but I fail to see how Philidelphia could act as a proxy for any one oscillation. El Nino events could give Philly a wet snowy winter; put then again so could a positive NAO. I completely agree with you in pointing out the obvious -any given point’s weather is determined by large scale synoptic patterns, which are in turn driven by changes in oceanic variability.