Although for many climate change produced by human activity is a problem that we have become aware of a few years ago, the truth is that in 1799 the first great debate already took place and, furthermore, in the USA, one of the countries that is having the hardest time taking aware of it.
Thomas Jefferson , considered one of the Founding Fathers of the Nation, was the third president of the United States of America (1801-1809). Being part of the representation of Virginia he participated in the drafting of Declaration of Independence of the United States (1776) , he tried to capture his republican ideals and… his concern for climate change . Jefferson had long been obsessed with rising temperatures and their possible consequences. So, on July 1, 1776, he began to record, in a personal diary, the daily temperature, average temperatures of months and years, weather phenomena, and any type of weather anomaly. He supported all these data in conversations with the elders of the place and the oral tradition.
Thomas Jefferson
In his book Notes on the State of Virginia (Notes on the State of Virginia), made clear his concern about rising temperatures in his home state and, by extension, in the US.
There is a noticeable change in the climate.
Winters are much more moderate.
Snows are less frequent and less copious. They are often not found below the mountains, more than a day or two, and very rarely a week.
The elders tell me that the land used to be covered in snow about three months a year and the rivers , which seldom do not freeze during the winter, now almost never do.
This change has produced a fluctuation between hot and cold, in the spring of this year, which is fatal for the fruits.
And like all Al Gore has his George W. Bush, Thomas Jefferson was not going to be less... Noah Webster appeared .
Noah Webster
Noah Webster was an American editor, journalist, political and textbook writer, recognized as the father of American schooling and education. In 1799, and before the newly created Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences , he attacked Jefferson, then vice president of the US, and his theory on climate change. Webster questioned the data provided due to the dubious accuracy of the thermometers, for being data taken in specific places and only by one person (remember that Jefferson wrote them down in a personal diary) and, in addition, relying on popular beliefs.
The clearing of forests to convert them into farmland has given rise to some microclimatic changes, windier and some variation in weather conditions in winter. But even if snow doesn't stay on the ground, it doesn't necessarily mean that the country as a whole gets less snow each winter. We have, in the fields, deep snow today, and not tomorrow, but the same amount of snow that falls in the forest, is there until spring.
Sadly, and for almost two centuries, Webster's speech has been in force.