32 Facts About Cleveland Abbe

Cleveland Abbe was an American meteorologist and advocate of time zones.

Cleveland Abbe was born in New York City in 1838 and grew up in the prosperous merchant family of George Waldo and Charlotte Colgate Abbe.

In school, Cleveland excelled in mathematics and chemistry, attending David B Scott Grammar School, and graduating in 1857 from the Free Academy with a Bachelor of Arts.

Cleveland Abbe tutored mathematics at the Trinity Latin School in New York City in 1857 and 1858.

Cleveland Abbe then taught engineering, as an assistant professor at the University of Michigan in 1859, followed by a tutoring job, in engineering, until he left in 1860.

Cleveland Abbe received his second degree, a Master of Arts in 1860, from City College.

Cleveland Abbe received his Bachelor of Science degree from Harvard in 1864, which marked the end of his working at the US Coast Survey.

Cleveland Abbe then studied abroad in Russia at the Observatory of Pulkovo, as a guest, and returned, in 1866, to the US eager to study astronomy.

Cleveland Abbe spent a few years in Cincinnati, but his interests were already evolving.

Cleveland Abbe won approval to report on and predict the weather, working on the premise that forecasts could and should be generated at minimal expense and in such a way as to perhaps even produce income.

Cleveland Abbe was appointed chief meteorologist at the United States Weather Bureau on 3 January 1871, which at the time was part of the US Signal Corps.

Cleveland Abbe recognized that predicting the weather required a widespread, yet coordinated team.

Cleveland Abbe selected data-collecting instruments that would be critical to the success of weather predicting, and he trained Army observer sergeants in their use.

On February 19,1871, Cleveland Abbe personally gave the first official weather report.

Cleveland Abbe continued to forecast alone for the next six months, while simultaneously training others.

Cleveland Abbe was joined in mid-1871 by two Army lieutenants and a civilian professor in giving reports, and the team was then able to rotate the heavy workload.

Cleveland Abbe demanded precise language in the forecasts and ensured that every forecast covered four key meteorological elements: weather, temperature, wind direction, and barometric pressure.

In 1872, Cleveland Abbe founded and was the initial editor of the Monthly Weather Review.

Cleveland Abbe was the editor from 1892 until 1915 just before his death.

The Mount Weather Observatory in Virginia produced a weather bulletin, of which Cleveland Abbe was the editor from 1909 to 1913.

Cleveland Abbe required that the weather service stay at the forefront of technology.

Cleveland Abbe enlisted Oliver Wolcott Gibbs of Harvard and Arthur Wright of Yale to design improved equipment.

For comparison purposes, Cleveland Abbe ordered a barometer from Heinrich Wild, as well as an anemometer and several types of hygrometers from Germany.

Cleveland Abbe then invented an anemobarometer to test the effect of chimney and window drafts on barometers in enclosed spaces.

Cleveland Abbe returned to academia in 1886, when he accepted a professorship at Columbian University, where he taught meteorology and remained until 1905.

Cleveland Abbe was a regular lecturer at Johns Hopkins from 1896 through 1914.

Cleveland Abbe was elected as a member of the American Philosophical Society in 1871.

Cleveland Abbe was one of the 33 founders of the National Geographic Society.

Cleveland Abbe enjoyed ethnology, oriental archaeology, geology, botany, and music in his off time.

Cleveland Abbe died in 1916 aged 77 years in Chevy Chase, MD after more than 45 years of scientific achievement.

Cleveland Abbe was buried in Rock Creek Cemetery in Washington, DC.

Cleveland Abbe founded the scientific journal Monthly Weather Review in 1872.