Weather and the Science of Settlement has been made possible by grants from History SA and the Historical Society of South Australia. Also essential has been the support in kind from the South Australian Regional Office of the Commonwealth Bureau of Meteorology. They provide office space and computer access, and, most importantly, its meteorologists provide ongoing advice and encouragement.
Weather and the Science of Settlement is Tony Rogers’ fourth weather-related book on the history of
South Australia.
Floods in South Australia: 1836 to 2005 (Commonwealth Bureau of Meteorology: 2006) chronicles flood that were reported between 1836 and 2005. Well over a million pages of newspaper reports were surveyed by a team of 90 researchers, some of whom were volunteers and others were employed as part of a work-for-the-dole project. Tony then led a team of four experienced researchers to revisit this material, analyse it, and write a synopsis of each flood event, finally combining these into a cohesive whole. The resulting book has proved popular with historians, engineers, educators, realtors and others. It was part of an even larger project directed by the then Regional Hydrologist. The book is available from the Adelaide office of the Bureau of Meteorology (ph. 8366-2600).
Weather Prophets of South Australia (Commonwealth Bureau of Meteorology: 2008) was
South Australia’s contribution to the celebration of the centenary of the Commonwealth Bureau of Meteorology. The book tells the story of meteorology in
South Australia from the earliest days after Charles Todd’s arrival in 1855 to the present day. Some fifty present and former employees of the Bureau also shared their personal stories. The more than 100 hours of interviews, and several thousand pages of transcripts, are now part of the oral history collection of the State Library of South Australia. The book is available from the Adelaide office of the Bureau of Meteorology (ph. 8366 2600).
South Australia’s Extreme Weather: Its Human Impact (Australian Meteorological Association: 2009) recounts sixteen extreme weather events in the State. Heat waves, floods, droughts, tornadoes, snow, rain and hail are all in the book. So too are the human stories, some never told before. The book was published in association with the Bureau of Meteorology and each weather event is re-examined by meteorologists in the South Australian office. Using today’s knowledge, the results are sometimes surprising, always interesting and lead us to reassess past history. There are also 150 compelling images.The book is available from the
Royal Society for the Blind.
