Francis Reichelderfer | |
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Born | 6 August 1895 |
Died | 26 January 1983 (aged 87) Washington, D.C. |
Employer |
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Position held | director (1938–1963), president (1951–1955) |
Francis Wilton Reichelderfer (August 6, 1895 – January 26, 1983), also known as “Reich”, presided over a revolutionary era in the history of the Weather Bureau. He trained as a U.S. Navy pilot and from 1922 -1928, was appointed Chief of Navy Aerology because of his meteorological and aviation experience. In 1931, he was assigned to the Bergen School of Meteorology. From 1938 to 1963, Reich directed the Weather Bureau and brought modern technology to weather forecasting.
Reich was born in Harlan, Indiana, in 1895,[1] the son of a Methodist minister. He worked his way through college, rising at 3:30 a.m. to stoke the furnaces and wait tables in a women's dormitory. He did not even begin his career as a meteorologist, receiving a BS in chemistry and chemical engineering from Northwestern University in 1917.[1]
After 21 years of service, Reichelderfer retired from the U.S. Navy at age 43 to take on the role of Director and to bring the U.S. Weather Service into the modern age, a position he held for 25 years, voluntarily resigning in 1963.
Reich began his tenure as Weather Bureau Chief on December 15, 1938. Although an Air Mass Analysis Section[2] was developed in 1934, the Bureau staff had few career forecasters with scientific training. Reich recruited scientifically-trained colleagues including Carl Rossby, Harry Wexler, and Horace Byers, helped found and support training programs in scientific meteorology, and introduced rigorous examination of relevant data, including radiosonde [a modified "weather balloon" developed, in response to a U.S. Navy request, at the National Bureau of Standards by Francis Dunmore and Wilbur Hinmann, Jr. under the direction of Harry Diamond [Chief of Research and Development at the Bureau of Air Commerce measurements gathered from high in the atmosphere [The radiosonde was introduced to the Weather Bureau in 1937. It replaced air sampling by pilots who opened their planes at high altitudes.[3]]. To improve forecasting based on mass frontal movements, he collected and analyzed thousands of weather charts and developed a grid of strategically located weather stations, including shipboard ones, which would permit coordinated collection and analysis of the radiosonde data. Starting before the U.S. entered World War II, the Weather Bureau used data from two Atlantic U.S. Coast Guard Weather Stations[4] (WS1 and WS 2) to support and protect thousands of merchant convoys between the Western Hemisphere and Europe, civil and military aviation, and the movement of troop ships. With his naval aerology, shipboard, and aviation experience, his long career in the U. S. Navy, his calm demeanor, and excellent communication skills, “Reich” brought broad expertise to the task of leading the Weather Bureau during the war.
He understood the need for worldwide weather services, helped institute wartime training for hundreds of meteorologists, recruited hundreds of women to replace the men who had entered the armed services, and served on the Joint Meteorological Committee composed of himself and the heads of the Army and Navy weather services. National leaders now viewed weather forecasting, possibly for the first time, as a worldwide strategic imperative affecting the movements of vast numbers of men and amounts of material.
Reichelderfer quickly grasped the importance of technological advances and soon pursued radar as a weather observation and forecast tool. He advanced the study of climatology by overseeing the production of a forty-year series of carefully analyzed surface maps that showed weather patterns dating back to 1899. These aided World War II forecasts and also served as research guides. During the war years he also established an Air Mass and Frontal Analysis Center, which served as a model for other nations' weather services in the years following the war. After the war, “Reich” continued pressing forward, always on the lookout for new methods and new ideas. He was eager to adopt radar meteorology. Earlier proposals by L. F. Richardson in the 1920s, whose formulas for analyzing meteorological data were impractical at the time, led to trials with the first electronic computers [ See John von Neumann Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, ENIAC]; it would take more powerful computers to handle the mass of data required to make timely, accurate forecasts. A controversial era in Reich's life followed World War II, when cloud physics and the potential for producing rain by seeding clouds with silver iodide or dry ice gained many supporters. Insisting on evidence of effectiveness before committing to such an approach, Reich was accused of being reactionary, but tests by the National Academy of Sciences and others justified his commitment to rigorous proof. So did the beginnings of hurricane research programs, the Aircraft Operations Center, the National Severe Storms Laboratory, and the Air Resources Laboratory. Perhaps the greatest of weather observation innovations, the meteorological satellite, was also introduced during his tenure with the launch of TIROS I on April 1, 1960.
When he retired, in 1963, President John F. Kennedy said:
"You have held the post of Chief of the Weather Bureau with great distinction under four presidents...As Chief of the Weather Bureau, you presided over the evolution of meteorology and weather forecasting from an art to a science."[5]
American Meteorological Society, charter member, fellow, honorary member, and President, 1941-42; Cleveland Abbe Award 1964, Distinguished Service, Special Award 1972. The Francis W. Reichelderfer Award was established in his honor in 1982
National Academy of Sciences, 1945
American Geophysical Union, vice president 1949-1953, and 1959-1960; Meteorological Section President 1944-47.
World Meteorological Organization founder and first President 1951-1955 [note: The World Meteorological Organization, under the UN, was the result of the reorganization of the International Meteorological Organization founded in 1873.]
International Meteorological Organization Prize, 1964[6]
American Institute of Aeronautical Sciences
Cosmos Club, Federal Club
Reichelderfer was a sailor, aviator, meteorologist, visionary, and administrator. His greatest strengths were comprehending where meteorology should be going, acting to move in that direction, and then attracting and keeping the talent to make it happen. He was instrumental in making important changes in the Weather Bureau through his ability to guide the organization; work with, encourage, and direct talented individuals; and work within the military and political systems of the U.S. and international bodies. His influence transcended the national boundaries as he helped form the World Meteorological Organization and served as its first president in 1951.[7]