Visitors to this site may wonder why there is a separate menu heading solely to address the weather 100 years ago. Those living here in 2001 are sensitive to suggestions that Buffalo doesn't have good weather or, more importantly, doesn't have a good weather image. Oddly, however, people who cannot tolerate late-night pundits making negative comments about our weather today are the same people who declare that the weather during the summer of 1901 was the worst imaginable. Let us examine the weather, if only to provide open-minded people with facts for their contemplation...

One hundred years ago, the National Weather Service was a young organization, having been established in 1870 by an act of Congress. Buffalo native, Brigadier General Albert J. Meyer, was its first head. Its meteorologists, stationed in cities around the country, were linked by telegraph and telephone. Weather forecasting basically consisted of gathering intelligence from cities to the north, west, and south about their current weather so that you could say with a modicum of authority what kind of weather was headed into your region. Needless to say, forecasts were made only for the upcoming day.

Below are newspaper articles and actual 1901 recorded weather information from the National Climate Data Center that compares the summer of 1901 with the summer of 2000. More articles will be added in future. But two things are clear: 1901 Buffalonians were as sensitive about the weather as their 2001 counterparts; and Pan-American visitors cannot be blamed for any negative Buffalo weather image today...