CLOUDS

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In 1796 Luke Howard¹ and his fellow Quaker William Allen became members of the Askesian Society, a philosophical group. Two years later the pair joined the Plough Court Pharmacy in Lombard Street.² In 1801 Howard started to maintain a systematic record of his meteorological observations. During the winter of 1802-3 he presented a paper on cloud formation to the Society. This almost certainly drew upon the Linnean classification system. In 1803 the material was published as On The Modifications of Clouds. This set out the three principal categories: cirrus (the Latin for a lock of hair ), cumulus ( a pile ), and stratus ( a layer ). In addition, there were also intermediate classifications and compound modifications.

In 1805 Howard and Allen dissolved their business partnership. The former moved to Stratford where he established a wholesale pharmaceuticals business as well as supplying chemicals to industry. His customers included the scientist, John Dalton. Howard s The Climate of London (1820) was the first study of the city s weather. He used the work to expound innovative ideas on subjects such as how rain is triggered and what the nature of atmospheric electricity is. The two-volume work changed the way in which clouds were represented in art.

Website: www.tottenhamclouds.org.uk

¹. The painter Howard Hodgkin (1932-2017), a kinsman of Luke Howard, was named after him.

². The Plough Court Pharmacy had been founded in 1715 by Silvanus Bevan. Under the control of the Hanbury family, the business evolved into Allen & Hanbury, which was bought by Glaxo Laboratories in 1958.

Artistic Impact

Titian had a capacity for being able to make paint appear to be light. He was a notable painter of weather. His clouds seemed to be moving and changing; they encapsulated the way in which his works engendered an appreciation of a change that was about to occur.

The painter John Constable referred to Titian s Diana and Actaeon (1559) by incorporating a tree from it in The Hay Wain (1821). There is a high degree of probability that Constable s skyscapes came to be informed by The Climate of London.

The Cloud Factory

London s clouds used to be made principally at Didcot Power Station in Oxfordshire. Once made, the prevailing westerly winds would blow them over the metropolis. The fact became known to the general public after the poet Roger McGough overheard a small child refer to the cloud factory as the train that they were both travelling upon passed the facility.

The coal-powered facility closed in 2015. Alternative arrangements for cumulus production appear to have been put in place by then.

Literary Impact

Howard s work prompted Percy Bysshe Shelley to write the poem The Cloud (1820).

The German writer and polymath Goethe (1749-1832) had been working on the subject of morphology and was deeply impressed by Howard s writing. He wrote a letter to Howard, who initially assumed that one of his friends must be teasing him. Eventually, he was convinced that it was Goethe who had written to him and replied. Goethe felt moved to write his poem Howards Ehrenged chtnis (1821) (In Honour of Howard).

Location: 15 Poland Street, W1F 8PR. Shelley s residence. (red, turquoise)

David Backhouse 2024