Page 84 - James Rodger Fleming - Fixing the sky

The arrival of “Generals” Dyrenforth, Powers, and Ruggles coincided with
a summer dry spell but also, conveniently, with the traditional (and commonly
known) onset of the rainy or monsoon season, when winds from the Gulf of
Mexico and the Gulf of California typically bring showers and thunderstorms
to the high plains. Dyrenforth, broad-shouldered and brash, wearing cavalry
boots and a campaign pith helmet, gave a public address to dramatize the
situation and heighten the sense of accomplishment if his rainmaking experi-
ments happened to succeed. He emphasized the barrenness and extreme arid-
ity of the region, the heat, harsh Sun, cloudless sky, dry south wind, alkaline
soil, and feeling that his skin was turning into parchment. Although even as he
spoke the winds were beginning to loft moisture across Texas from the south,
he pointed out the current local dry conditions. He was sure that, by his tech-
nique, Midland’s wells and lakes would fill up, its fine soils would produce a
bountiful crop, and there would be little left to desire—if the region could only
be supplied with water.
At the “C” Ranch, a front line of attack was established with sixty make-
shift mortars constructed from 6-inch well pipe. His crew tamped charges of
dynamite into prairie dog holes, placed them on flat stones, and draped mes-
quite bushes with rackarock. The electrical kites and the oxy-hydrogen bal-
loons formed the second and third lines of battle. The contract meteorologist,
George E. Curtis, deployed barometers, thermometers, sling psychrometers,
and an anemometer, but curiously no rain gauges and no electrical measuring
36
apparatus. The first rain fell on August 13, before any experiments had been
made, but the Chicago Herald reported this event as “heavy rain at the ranch in
response to the party’s efforts.” This on a day when the U.S. Weather Bureau was
predicting rain and showers in the state, mainly east of Midland. Still, Dyren-
forth assumed that he had had some effect in causing the nimbus clouds to drop
their loads on Midland and claimed that he had caused a “very heavy rain” of
about an inch that day.
The reporter on assignment from the Farm Implement News had a differ-
ent perspective. The headline read: “News from the Rainmakers. They fail on
account of the dry weather and because their apparatus won’t work. The ele-
ments play them false.” of their efforts he wrote,

Their kites fail to fly . . . , their hydrogen tanks and their balloons leak, and even the
clouds fail to cooperate. . . . When the gas generating furnace caught fire, eventu-
ally a cowboy roped the blazing furnace and dragged it into a stock tank and extin-
guished the flame. . . . And when a cumulus cloud happens to pass their way, rain
often falls before they can make their explosive apparatus work. 37

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