Soy de Duval

POSTED BY:  CARDENAS.AE@GMAIL.COM   SEPTEMBER 26, 2015 In last week’s blog, we looked at an amazing experiment conducted in San Diego in 1891. Folks actually believed they could make rain by setting off explosives and rattling the clouds. The latter part of 1891 saw a severe drought beset Duval County and thousands of cattle were dying from hunger and thirst. It was not surprising that some ranchmen would reach for any hopeful proposal to end the drought. Robert Kleberg and N. G. Collins raised funds to bring a meteorologist named John Ellis from Oberlin College to replicate a seemingly successful experiment he had conducted in Midland, Texas. They brought in an old canon from the King Ranch and with the help of an Army detachment from Fort Bliss, they set-up their equipment on the Collins Ranch a couple of miles northeast of San Diego. Ellis climbed into a balloon and rose into the heavens to check the clouds. The soldiers, meanwhile, filled small balls with powder and soake...

POSTED BY:  CARDENAS.AE@GMAIL.COM   SEPTEMBER 19, 2015 In the middle of October 1891, residents of San Diego could hardly sleep for three nights as bombardments exploded through the night. They were not under attack from a foreign enemy; they were party to a rainmaking experiment that captured the attention farmers and scientists near and far. Twenty years earlier, a fellow by the name of Edward Powers had written a book entitled War and the Weather in which he observed that shortly after intense battles involving heavy cannon fire it would rain. Edwards hypothesized that men could artificially make rain by use of explosives. Congress approved $9,000 to stimulate this notion and an initial experiment in Midland, Texas appeared to prove successful. Robert Kleberg of the King Ranch and N. G. Collins of San Diego traveled to Midland to talk with farmers in the area to see what they thought about the experiment. They were impressed and invited the rainmakers to come to South Texas...