Autobiography

13

Mr. E.S. Cherborough or W.H. Clarke Engineers Chicago will tell you of their value to them in devising plans for the sewerage and for the Water Works at Chicago.
In December 1869 I sent to Hon Halbert E. Paine member of Congress from Milwaukee a memorial representing the duty and necessity of some effort to prevent the loss of life and property on the Great Lakes; the possibility of predicting the occurrence of great storms and how it could be done. The memorial was accompanied by a long list of disasters that had occurred upon the lakes in that year, and was the means of securing the adoption of measures for Weather predictions which have grown to be of so much importance, not only to the commerce of the Lakes and Ocean but in many other ways. I spent most of the winter of 1870-71 in Chicago assisting in the organization of the signal service and in making up the results of observations upon which the first storm predictions or probabilities were based.
How much every sailor, ship owner, and others engaged in the commerce of our great lakes were other person who daily...