Isaac's Storm (13 page)

For
Isaac,
this
was
explanation
enough.
The
deadly
flood
was
the
downstream
flow
of
flash-melted
hail.
He
wrote
an
article
on
the
incident
for
the
weather
service's
Monthly
Weather
Review,
edited
by
Cleveland
Abbe.
To
Isaac's
"surprise
and
chagrin,"
Abbe
rejected
the
article
on
grounds
it
was
too
far-fetched
to
be
believed.

The
rejection
stung.
Isaac
had
been
there
when
the
flood
came
through.
He
saw
the
fish.
He
had
thrust
his
hands
in
the
ice-cold
water.
The
shock
of
it
on
that
August
day
in
Texas
was
embedded
in
his
brain.

Isaac
could
not
let
it
go.
Hail
became
a
transient
obsession.
He
tracked
down
reports
of
monster
hail
from
all
over
the
country.
It
was
true,
he
wrote,
that
no
one
previously
had
reported
a
hailstorm
so
big
as
to
produce
a
river
of
fish-paralyzing
ice
water,
but
on
June
30,
1877,
hailstones
as
large
as
oranges
killed
ponies
at
Yellowstone
Valley,
and
on
June
2,
1881,
in
White
Hall,
Illinois,
hailstones
the
size
of
goose
eggs
piled
to
twelve
inches
deep,
and
on
June
12,
1881,
hailstones
as
large
as
a
man's
fist
fell
on
three
counties
in
Iowa
and
piled
to
depths
of
two
or
three
feet,
and
on
June
16,
1882,
hailstones
up
to
seventeen
inches
around
and
weighing
two
pounds
fell
at
Dubuque,

Iowa.

Which
was
Isaac's
loyal,
obedient,
oblique,
three-cushion
way
of
stating
that
the
great
Cleveland
Abbe
had
been
wrong
to
reject
his
paper.
Isaac
was
nothing
if
not
credible,
and
did
not
like
having
his
credibility
challenged.

ISAAC
FELL
IN
love.

The
Signal
Corps
had
moved
his
station
to
Abilene
where
Isaac
began
attending
the
city's
Baptist
church,
led
by
Pastor
George
W.
Smith.
He
was
struck
by
the
beauty
of
the
music,
and
more
to
the
point,
by
the
beauty
of
the
young
organist
who
produced
it.
The
woman
was
Cora
May
Bellew,
a
niece
of
Pastor
Smith's
who
was
living
in
the
pastor's
house.

"She
was
a
beautiful,
brilliant
and
cultured
girl,"
Isaac
wrote.
"She
had
more
attraction
for
me
than
any
woman
I
had
ever
known."

He
wooed
her,
won
her,
and,
on
March
17,
1887,
married
her.
He
remained
true
to
his
belief
that
one's
time
should
be
used
efficiently,
an
ethos
that
Frederick
Winslow
Taylor
soon
would
bring
to
American
industry.
An
inefficient
man,
Taylor
said,
was
like
"a
bird
that
can
sing

but
won't
sing."

Isaac
could
sing,
and
did.
On
December
10,1887,
after
just
eight
and
a
half
months
of
marriage,
Cora
May
gave
birth
to
a
daughter.
The
Clines
named
her
Allie
May.

THE
CLAMOR
TO
reform
the
weather
service
continued
to
grow.
Demand
for
better
and
more
useful
forecasts
intensified.
Until
the
creation
of
the
weather
service,
individuals
had
relied
on
their
own
meteorological
savvy
—
and
assorted
almanacs,
crackpots,
and
backwoods
lore
—
to
produce
their
own
forecasts
of
the
weather,
just
as
they
produced
their
own
soap,
bread,
and
clothing.
But
America
as
a
whole
was
shifting
rapidly
toward
a
consumer
culture
in
which
remote
factories
produced
the
things
families
needed.
Now
a
farmer
could
get
a
daily
report
from
the
Weather
Bureau.
"In
the
past
the
man
has
been
first,"
Frederick
Taylor
wrote,
"in
the
future
the
system
must
be
first."
But
was
the
system
up
to
the
task?

The
weather
service
needed
a
hero,
and
got
one.
On
January
16,
1887,
Gen.
Adolphus
W.
Greely
took
over
as
chief
of
the
Signal
Corps.
He
was
by
now
one
of
the
most
famous
men
in
America,
albeit
famous
for
having
barely
survived
the
failure
of
his
1881
expedition
to
Lady
Franklin
Bay
in
the
Arctic,
which
left
him
marooned
until
his
rescue
in
July
1884
by
Capt.
Winfield
Scott
Schley
of
the
U.S.
Navy,
whose
daring
expedition
made
him
a
celebrity
as
well.

Captain
Howgate,
the
embezzler,
was
still
at
large.
Congress
launched
a
formal
investigation
of
the
weather
service.
To
gauge
just
how
far
the
service
had
fallen,
General
Greely
dispatched
inspectors
to
weather
stations
around
the
country.
In
Greely's
first
year,
he
dismissed
one
hundred
employees
for
all
manner
of
offenses,
including
some
that
suggest
that
weathermen
of
the
day
were
not
drab
bureaucrats
who
spent
their
lives
watching
mercury
rise
and
fall.
He
fired
one
New
England
observer
for
indulging
his
passion
for
photography
on
bureau
time.
The
observer
turned
the
office
into
a
studio
where
he
photographed
nude
young
women.

A
fondness
for
extended
fishing
trips
caused
the
head
of
the
Rocky
Mountain
district
to
engage
in
some
long-range
forecasting.
He
would
create
a
week's
worth
of
weather
observations,
then
unload
them
at
the
telegraph
office
with
instructions
to
the
operator
to
send
them
one
by
one
over
the
following
week.
This
worked
fine,
apparendy
—
a
testament
either
to
the
consistent
character
of
Rocky
Mountain
weather
or
the
observer's
real
forecasting
savvy
—
until
one
of
Greely's
inspectors
dropped
in
without
warning.
Finding
the
office
vacant,
the
inspector
went
to
the
telegraph
office
and
there
discovered
a
neat
stack
of
timed
and
dated
weather
reports
awaiting
transmission.

An
observer
in
the
Midwest
turned
out
to
be
a
compulsive
poker
player.
Desperate
for
cash,
he
hocked
the
station's
instruments.
He
took
his
daily
readings
at
the
pawnshop.

On
January
21,
1888,
while
Isaac
was
still
at
Fort
Concho,
one
of
Greely's
inspectors
walked
into
the
Galveston
station.
At
the
time
it
occupied
the
third
floor
of
a
building
that
served
as
the
city's
police
station
and
courthouse.
The
inspector,
Lt.
J.
H.
Weber,
arrived
at
1:00
P.M.,
and
was
greeted
by
Private
E.
D.
Chase,
the
soldier
then
in
charge.
Lieutenant
Weber
checked
the
barometers
with
a
plumb
line
to
see
if
they
were
standing
vertically.
He
checked
whether
they
had
enough
mercury
and
if
air
had
infiltrated
their
vacuum
tubes.
He
reviewed
the
station's
wind-signal
record
book
and
its
expense
book,
and
evaluated
the
performance
and
appearance
of
each
man
assigned
to
the
station.

He
did
not
like
what
he
saw.
He
had
not
liked
much
of
anything
since
the
moment
he
arrived.
Above
all
he
did
not
like
Private
Chase.

The
barometers
were
filthy.
Lieutenant
Weber
had
to
clean
them
just
to
read
the
scales.
Galveston
merchants
and
agents
of
the
Cotton
Exchange
complained
loudly
of
neglect.
Noted
Weber,
"They
hardly
look
at
the
local
office
for
information
but
depend
mostly
upon
St.
Louis
and
New
Orleans
papers
for
weather
news."
The
station
itself,
he
wrote
was
in
"execrable"
condition.
"Gentlemen
should
not
be
compelled
to
occupy
quarters
in
which
one
would
not
kennel
a
well-bred
canine."

The
blame
for
this
he
laid
entirely
at
the
boots
of
Private
Chase
"This
man
should
be
discharged
for
his
miserable
work
while
in
charge
here,"
Lieutenant
Weber
wrote.
"He
is
not
fit
to
remain
in
the
service."

AND
THEN
CAME
Monday,
March
12,1888:
The
Signal
Corps's
forecast
for
New
York
City
predicted
"colder,
fresh
to
brisk
westerly
winds,
fair
weather."

What
New
York
got
was
the
Blizzard
of
'88.
Twenty-one
inches
of
snow
fell
on
the
city.
Two
hundred
New
Yorkers
died.
Nearly
four
feet
covered
Albany.
The
storm
killed
four
hundred
people
throughout
the
Northeast.

This
did
not
help.
Not
at
all.

ISAAC
CLINE
WAS
twenty-seven
years
old.
He
had
a
kind
smile
and
welcoming
manner,
but
a
backbone
like
a
frigate's
mast
and
a
capacity
for
heroic
amounts
of
work.
He
was
exacdy
the
kind
of
man
the
Signal
Corps
saw
as
its
salvation.
In
March
1889,
General
Greely
ordered
him
to
take
over
the
failing
Galveston
station
and,
further,
to
establish
the
first
Texas-wide
weather
service.

Isaac
stepped
from
his
train
into
a
neat,
well-ordered
place,
with
alphabet
streets
running
east
and
west,
numbered
streets
running
north
and
south.
He
had
grown
accustomed
to
the
stark
greens
and
grays
of
the
sagescape
that
surrounded
Abilene.
The
sudden
blue
of
Galveston
cooled
his
mind.
He
was
struck,
as
all
visitors
were,
by
how
flat
the
city
was,
so
close
to
sea
level
as
to
produce
the
illusion
that
ships
in
the
Gulf
were
sailing
on
the
streets.

Avenue
B,
he
quickly
learned,
was
more
commonly
called
the
Strand.
The
Wall
Street
of
the
West.
It
sliced
across
the
northern
edge
of
the
city
just
below
the
arc
of
wood
and
iron
that
formed
the
wharf
front.
The
downtown
streets
were
paved
with
flush-hammered
wooden
blocks
and
walled
by
knee-high
curbs.
Drays,
sulkies,
landaus,
and
victorias,
with
calash
tops
raised
against
the
sun,
eased
along
behind
cautious
head-down
horses
picking
their
way
among
the
uneven
seams.
Each
hoof
struck
the
pavement
with
the
thud
of
a
mallet
against
wood,
evoking
the
earscape
of
a
building
under
construction.
The
clatter
reinforced
the
aura
of
enterprise
and
industry.

Where
Abilene
had
been
a
rude
new
town
still
redolent
of
fresh-cut
wood,
Galveston
had
substance.
The
size
of
its
buildings
and
the
obvious
care
invested
in
their
construction
betrayed
the
city's
ambition
to
become
something
much
bigger.
Even
in
its
hedonic
infrastructure,
Galveston
displayed
grand
aspirations.
The
city
had
five
hundred
saloons,
more
than
New
Orleans,
a
city
not
exactly
known
for
banking
its
fires.
Galveston's
poshest
whorehouse
was
situated
right
behind
its
richest
men's
club,
the
Artillery
Club,
which
barred
women
except
for
an
annual
ball
and
the
occasional
coming-out
party
of
a
member's
daughter.
The
city's
most
disreputable
block
was
Fat
Alley,
between
28th
and
29th.
In
Galveston
alcohol
was
blood,
but
one
could
also
gamble,
acquire
love,
and
lose
oneself
in
an
opium
mist.