Weather: An Illustrated History: From Cloud Atlases to Climate Change

by Andrew Revkin, Lisa Mechaley

Overview

“Beautifully illustrated . . . Think of this book like dining on tapas, boasting savory flavors, some unexpected, that constitute a satisfying whole.” —Washington Post

Andrew Revkin, strategic adviser for environmental and science journalism at the National Geographic Society and former senior climate reporter at ProPublica, presents an intriguing illustrated history of humanity’s evolving relationship with Earth’s dynamic climate system and the wondrous weather it generates.

Colorful and captivating, Weather: An Illustrated History hopscotches through 100 meteorological milestones and insights, from prehistory to today’s headlines and tomorrow’s forecasts. Bite-sized narratives, accompanied by exciting illustrations, touch on such varied topics as Earth's first atmosphere, the physics of rainbows, the deadliest hailstorm, Groundhog Day, the invention of air conditioning, London’s Great Smog, the Year Without Summer, our increasingly strong hurricanes, and the Paris Agreement on climate change.

Written by a prominent and award-winning environmental author and journalist, this is a groundbreaking illustrated book that traces the evolution of weather forecasting and climate science.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781454921400
Publisher:	Union Square & Co.
Publication date:	05/01/2018
Series:	Union Square & Co. Illustrated Histories
Pages:	224
Sales rank:	666,443
Product dimensions:	6.90(w) x 8.80(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Andrew Revkin is one of America’s most honored and experienced journalists focused on environmental and human sustainability. In the spring of 2018, he joined the staff of the National Geographic Society as strategic adviser for environmental and science journalism. Formerly the senior reporter for climate issues at the Pulitzer Prize-winning ProPublica and the Pace University Senior Fellow for Environmental Understanding, he has reported on science and the environment for more than three decades, mainly for The New York Times. He has written on global warming science and solutions and energy issues since the 1980s, from the North Pole to the White House, and is among those credited with first proposing that we have entered a “geological age of our own making,” known increasingly as the Anthropocene. He has won top awards in science journalism multiple times, along with a Guggenheim Fellowship. Revkin has written acclaimed books on global warming, the changing Arctic, and the violent assault on the Amazon rain forest, as well as three book chapters on science communication. Drawing on his experience with his Times blog, Dot Earth, which Time Magazine named one of the top 25 blogs in 2013, Revkin has spoken to audiences around the world, including at the United Nations and Vatican, about paths to progress on a turbulent planet. In spare moments, he is a performing songwriter and was a frequent accompanist for Pete Seeger. He lives in Cold Spring, NY, with his wife and coauthor, Lisa Mechaley, who is an educator at the Children’s Environmental Literacy Foundation.

Table of Contents

Introduction viii

Acknowledgments xi

4.567 Billion BCE Earth Gets an Atmosphere 1

4.3 Billion BCE Water World 3

2.9 Billion BCE Pink Skies and Ice 5

2.7 Billion BCE First Fossil Traces of Raindrops 7

2.4 Billion-423 Million BCE The Icy Path to Fire 9

252 Million BCE Lethal Heat and the "Great Dying" 11

66 Million BCE Dinosaurs' Demise, Mammals Rise 13

56 Million BCE The Feverish Eocene 15

34 Million BCE A Southern Ocean Chills Things 17

10 Million BCE The Rise of Tibet and the Asian Monsoon 19

100,000 BCE Climate Pulse Propels Populations 21

15,000 BCE A Super Drought 23

9,700 BCE The Fertile Crescent 25

5,300 BCE North Africa Dries and the Pharaohs Rise 27

5,000 BCE Agriculture Warms the Climate 29

350 BCE Aristotle's Meteorologies 31

300 BCE China Shifts from Mythology to Meteorology 33

1088 ce Shen Kuo Writes of Climate Change 35

1100 Medieval Warmth to a Little Ice Age 37

1571 The Age of Sail 39

1603 The Invention of Temperature 41

1637 Deciphering the Rainbow 43

1644 The Weight of the Atmosphere 45

1645 A Spotless Sun 47

1714 Fahrenheit Standardizes Degrees 49

1721 Four Seasons on Four Strings 51

1735 Mapping the Winds 53

1752 Benjamin Franklin's Lightning Rod 55

1755 Franklin Chases a Whirlwind 57

1783 First Weather Balloon Flight 59

1792 The Farmer's Almanac 61

1802 Luke Howard Names the Clauds 63

1802 Humboldt Maps a Connected Planet 65

1806 Beaufort Classifies the Winds 67

1814 London's Last Frost Fair 69

1816 An Eruption, Famine, and Monsters 71

1818 Watermelon Snow 73

1830 An Umbrella for Everyone 75

1840 Ice Ages Revealed 77

1841 Peat Bog History 79

1845 Cold Dooms an Arctic Explorer 81

1856 Scientists Discover Greenhouse Gases 83

1859 Space Weather Comes to Earth 85

1861 First Weather Forecasts 87

1862 California's Great Deluge 89

1870 Meteorology Gets Useful 91

1871 Midwestern Firestorms 93

1880 "Snowflake" Bentley 95

1882 Coordinating Arctic Science 97

1884 First Photographs of Tornadoes 99

1886 Groundhog Day 101

1887 Putting Wind to Work 103

1888 The Great White Hurricane 105

1888 Deadliest Hailstorm 107

1896 First International Cloud Atlas 109

1896 Coal, CO₂, and the Climate 111

1900 A Mighty Storm 113

1902 "Manufactured Weather" 115

1903 The Windshield Wiper 117

1903 A Dry Discovery 119

1911 The Great Blue Norther 121

1912 Orbits and Ice Ages 123

1922 A "Forecast Factory" 125

1931 "China's Sorrow" 127

1934 The Fastest Wind Gust 129

1935 The Dust Bowl 131

1941 Russia's "General Winter" 133

1943 Hurricane Hunters 135

1944 The Jet Stream Becomes a Weapon 137

1946 Rainmakers 139

1950 The First Computerized Forecast 141

1950 Tornado Warnings Advance 143

1952 London's Great Smog 145

1953 North Sea Flood 147

1958 The Rising Curve of CO₂ 149

1960 Watching Weather from Orbit 151

1960 Chaos and Climate 153

1965 A President's Climate Warning 155

1967 Climate Models Come of Age 157

1973 Storm Chasing Gets Scientific 159

1975 Dangerous Downbursts Revealed 161

1978 Sea Level Threat in Antarctic Ice 163

1983 The Coldest Place on Earth 165

1983 Nuclear Winter 167

1986 Forecasting El Niño 169

1988 Global Warming Becomes News 171

1989 Proof of Electrical "Sprites" 173

1993 Climate Clues in Ice and Mud 175

2006 The Human Factor in Weather Disasters 177

2006 Climate by Design? 179

2006 Long-Distance Dust 181

2007 Tracking the Oceans' Climate Role 183

2012 Science Probes the Political Climate 185

2012 Settling a Hot Debate 187

2014 The Polar Vortex 189

2015 Climate Diplomacy from Rio through Paris 191

2016 Arctic Sea Ice Retreat 193

2016 Extreme Lightning 195

2017 Reefs Feel the Heat 197

102,018 ce An End to Ice Ages? 199

Contributors 200

References 201

Image Credits 209

Index 210

About the Authors 212

Editorial Reviews

Praise for WEATHER: AN ILLUSTRATED HISTORY

“In a new, beautifully illustrated book, Andrew Revkin, best known for his decades of science and environment reporting at the New York Times, describes many of the most pivotal moments, critical scientific breakthroughs and important people in the climate’s rich and varied 4.5 billion-year history. ‘Weather: An Illustrated History, From Cloud Atlases to Climate Change,’ explores the atmosphere’s evolution, the scientists who tried to make sense of it, and the complex and sometimes-turbulent relationship between people and the elements. . . . Revkin loosely weaves together this history in 100 short, easy-to-consume vignettes. Think of this book like dining on tapas, boasting savory flavors, some unexpected, that constitute a satisfying whole. Among many other topics, the book discusses Aristotle’s ‘landmark’ contributions to meteorology. It explains how scientists figured out how rainbows work. It tells the story of inventor Charles F. Brush, who built a giant windmill in Cleveland in 1887 that powered his mansion for 20 years. It presents what is probably the first-ever photograph taken of a tornado. And it even delves into the polar vortex.” —Washington Post

“FINALLY, someone has done something about the weather. Andrew Revkin and Lisa Mechaley have given us a startlingly fascinating book about how weather got the way it is, and how we’ve reacted to it, used it, and even helped shape it. There are a hundred captivating stories in this book that are as enlightening as they are fun. Reading them is like seeing the clouds part and the sun come out.” —Alan Alda, longtime host of Scientific American Frontiers and a founder of the Alan Alda Center for Communicating Science at Stony Brook University 
 
 “Informative, addictively readable, and never preachy, Weather: An Illustrated History tells the fascinating story of humanity’s ever-evolving relationship with the earth’s climate. Highly recommended.” —Nathaniel Philbrick, National Book Award winner for In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex 
 
 “Weather: An Illustrated History is a gift of a book—at once fascinating, informative, and surprising.” —Elizabeth Kolbert, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Sixth Extinction
 
“A slim book about a weighty subject with a light touch, Weather: An Illustrated History has a wonderfully sprawling cast of characters, from Alexander von Humboldt and ‘Snowflake’ Bentley to Frankenstein's monster and the editor of the Farmer's Almanac. I won't soon forget the image of Benjamin Franklin charging off after a huge dust devil, leaving the rest of his party to gape in astonishment as he repeatedly horsewhipped the whirlwind to see if he could interrupt its progress. Or the great solar flare of Sept. 1, 1859, which lashed the Earth with such ferocity that the night sky glowed across the planet and electric surges through telegraph wires set telegraph offices afire.” —Charles C. Mann, bestselling author of 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus and The Wizard and the Prophet

From the Publisher