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Climate change has been a major environmental issue in recent years.
Canton is not new to the topic.
Since its inception, The Canton Repository has published articles about the changing climate for almost all of its history. This includes the two centuries that it was a weekly publication called The Ohio Repository.
Reports have not always been about “global Warming.”
“Has earth changed its axis, and its poles?” A Weekly Recorder article, dated Circleville (Ohio), was asked and republished in The Repository on its front page, July 13, 1820 issue. “Or has the accumulation of ice in the polar circles caused a change to our once mild climate?”
“If the climate has been growing colder for three centuries in the exact same way it has over the last thirty years, there is no other cause than the greater presence of that current of air flowing across our inland oceans, Erie and Michigan, Huron, Superior, etc. from the regions with perennial frost.”
Find warmth everywhere you look
The July 3, 1845 issue of the Repository published a more detailed investigation into climate change. It began to focus on global heating in a way that made it seem like this was not a new observation.
“The extraordinary change in climate over long periods has been observed and commented upon by all who have paid attention to the subject,” the article began. It is a common topic of remark that our winters are now milder in this area of the country. Many of our citizens recall that rivers used to be regularly frozen, so that a six-horse team could cross them. Good sleighing was an annual pleasure.
“Sleighing is almost non-existent now that rivers are rarely sufficiently frozen to allow for safe crossing.
The article pointed out that the world’s climate was also being affected, although it wasn’t necessarily warming. The reason was the altering of the revolutions at the magnetic poles.
“The cold is increasing in Europe and the heat is increasing in this country east of Pittsburgh.”
Other causes were also discussed
In a Scientific American article, cited on March 28, 1855, the theory that the paths of magnetic poles varied caused changes in world temperatire was cited again. It noted that “history tells us that many countries in Europe that now have very mild winters once experienced severe cold during that season of the year.”
Another theory was refuted in the article.
The article stated that “Some have attributed these climate changes to agriculture. This includes the cutting down dense forests, the exposure to the summer sun and the draining great marshes. “We don’t believe such drastic changes could have been caused by agriculture on the climate of any country.”
The Repository published an article on December 1, 1876 that identified another possible cause. The article cited research by a researcher who predicted that Europe would experience a colder climate following the proposed “piercing of Isthmus of Suez.”
The article explained that the researcher said that Europe’s moderate climate can be attributed to both warm water heating from the Gulf Stream and hot air heating from the wind blowing across the Sahara desert.
Modern science witnessed dramatic changes
The 20th century – beginning in earnest in the 1970s through the 1990s – brought a greater concern for changes in the climate.
“Around the world warning signs raise an insistent alarm – earth’s climate is changing, quickly and perhaps forebodingly,” began a Christian Science Monitor New Service article by David F. Salisbury published in the Repository on Sept. 2, 1974.
The unanimous verdict of climate scientists who met in Bonn (Germany) earlier in the year was published in the article.
“The studies by many scholars, attest to the fact that a new pattern in climate is now emerging,” said that group. “We believe that climate change poses a danger to the peoples of the world. Its direction… indicates major crops failures almost certainly within a decade.”
Historical evidence supported the urgency of the change.
“Examination of the history of the world’s climate indicates that it has fluctuated widely in the past – oceans rising and falling, icecaps growing and shrinking, deserts forming and vanishing – but it appears that most of the time over the past few million years it has been cooler and less benign than what mankind today considers ‘normal.’
“Moreover, there are some indications that changes in climate can occur quickly, sometimes within decades. These fluctuations have been linked to the demise of ancient, flourishing civilisations in the past.
Later, Mankind was cited as a cause
Five years later, on December 2, 1979, a New York Times Service Article was republished by the Repository. The article examined signs that “point toward a warmer world” and suggested that “increased fuel burning could alter climate.”
“What will be the climate of the future? Warmer? Colder? The article stated that few questions are more important for those who need to plan future energy and agricultural policies. “Redoubled efforts have been made to make even moderately reliable predictions, but this has brought home the complexity of climate-related factors.
The article reported that a study done for the White House by the National Academy of Sciences, analyzed “climate changes to be expected from heavy burning of fossil fuels – notably coal.”
“It concluded that within a half-century such combustion could double the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and thereby warm it an average of about 6 degrees Fahrenheit – enough to cause major climate changes that conceivably could turn farmland to desert or make deserts fertile.”
Opposing views were also presented. Two scientists were cited in the Times article who claimed that the Academy’s assessment of the situation was premature.
“They claim that the final assessment of the impact is ‘too complicated’ to be judged. This has been proven by the academy panel and others using simple computer simulations of atmospheric behaviour.
More research is eventually done
In several reports published in Repository in the 1990s, two decades worth of additional research were reflected.
“Recent weather data links climate and solar variations,” was the headline for an article published by the newspaper on June 17, 1996.
“So far, climate change research has primarily focused on greenhouse gasses, the most prominent being carbon dioxide,” Matt Crenson, Associated Press Science editor, noted. “But, if there is a significant role for the sun, the climatologists will need to alter their theories and their predictions of future climate changes.”
Linda Seebach, New York Times columnist, wrote a column that was published in the Repository Dec. 31, 1996. It asked, according its headline, “Global Warming: Myth or Threat?”
The column urged caution when considering scientific theories regarding global warming.
Seebach wrote that Vice President Al Gore wrote a book called “Earth in the Balance” back in the days when he was still rooted in the Senate. This book accepted all apocalyptic models (most of which are no longer believable) and uncritically accepted them all. He called for a Strategic Environmental Initiative to ‘establish coordinated global programs to accomplish the strategic goal, which is to eliminate the internal-combustion engine completely over a period of 25 years.
“I wouldn’t say that the cure is better than the disease. We don’t know for sure. It’s so dangerous to our political and financial liberties that we must be certain of the diagnosis before we make any commitments. Science at the moment doesn’t offer any such certainty.
A few last words
Yet, a Washington Post article by Joby warrick published in the Repository on Dec. 11, 1998, still acknowledged that “Earth’s a hot place to live.”
Jonathan Overpeck is the head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Paleoclimatology Program. He said, “New research that documents the climate change as far back the Holy Roman Empoire strengthens the argument that humans may be partly responsible for rising temperatures.”
Warrick noted that Overpeck cited factors – scientific and historical – to support his hypothesis that “Twentieth-century global warming is a reality and should be taken seriously.”
Warrick wrote that “The average temperature at Earth’s surface has increased about 1 degree Fahrenheit” since the 1880s, with many of the warmest years in the last decade.
Reach Gary at [email protected]. Twitter: @gbrownREP
