Book Display: The Weather Keepers

About

158 Years of Meteorological Observation at the DEI

In 1817, John Squance, the DEI's first librarian, began recording the weather. Every day, three times a day, he noted temperature and pressure, rainfall, humidity and general conditions. When he died, his daughter Eliza succeeded him and carried on the registers without interruption. What followed was 158 years of mostly unbroken observation. The DEI became an official climatological station, and had its readings published daily in the local press. Instruments accumulated: some donated by local physicians and scientists, others made by an optician on the High Street. Some were destroyed in the 1942 bombing; others survived and are included in the display.

On display are some of the instruments used and the registers themselves, opened at moments that mark the changing practice of weather recording over time. The volumes also carry traces of the people who kept them: different hands, different scripts, different ways of noting a cloudy afternoon. Each librarian inherited both a role and a responsibility, and left their own quiet mark upon it.

This display has been curated by Deborah Ashfield, AHRC-SWWDTP PhD Researcher in Environmental Humanities at the University of Exeter. Drop into our 'Meet the curator' event on Wednesday 8th June between 1-3pm, where Deborah will be on hand to discuss this fascinating display.