Memories of the Bureau of Meteorology
Preface
Memories of the Bureau of Meteorology 1929–1946 by Allan Cornish
Foreword
Chapter 1: My Early Days in the Bureau
Chapter 2: Some New Vistas
Chapter 3: The RAAF Measures Upper Air Temperatures
Chapter 4: The Bureau Begins to Grow
Chapter 5: My Voyage in Discovery II
Chapter 6: The Birth of the Instrument Section
Chapter 7: Darwin Days
Chapter 8: I Leave the Bureau
History of Major Meteorological Installation in Australia from 1945 to 1981 by Reg Stout
Four Years in the RAAF Meteorological Service by Keith Swan
The Bureau of Meteorology in Papua New Guinea in the 1950s by Col Glendinning
Index
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Foreword (continued)
Allan's father returned to Brunswick in 1917. Allan continued his education at State School until the eighth grade. He then won a scholarship to the Workingmen's College and had two years in the Junior Technical School and then moved into the Senior School for the third year of a five year Diploma course. The Workingmen's College was located more or less where the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology is now, near the City Baths. Allan was keen to attend university to do Engineering but to achieve this ambition he needed a part-time job and other assistance. His father (at that time working for a produce firm) supported him while he completed first-year Engineering at the University of Melbourne.In 1929 Allan saw an advertisement in the paper for people called Meteorological Assistants and applied for the job. His application for the position resulted in his being one of three successful applicants appointed as Meteorological Assistants late in 1929.
Allan's paternal grandfather had been a tin miner in Truro in Cornwall and his grandmother was born in Dublin. They came to Australia as a married couple. His father was born about 1887.
To make a sentimental journey in 1967 to his grandfather's birthplace Allan and his wife Janet took ten months furlough, bought a car and holidayed in England and the continent. Travelling through Surrey towards Cornwall Allan saw Truro on the map and thought 'let's go there'.
People in Surrey spoke with a strong local accent, entirely different from the accent in Cornwall. In Surrey they had cold pies and warm beer. In Cornwall they had warm pasties and cool beer.
It was a rainy, cold day. Allan and Jan wandered into a Cornish pub where a lot of Cornishmen were seated around a big fire, drinking beer. The moment they walked in an old man rose from his chair, sat Jan in front of the fire and began to talk to them. People in Surrey had been less friendly.
People in Bright Sparcs - Cornish, Allan William
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© Online Edition Australian Science and Technology Heritage Centre and Bureau of Meteorology 2001
Published by Australian Science and Technology Heritage Centre, using the Web Academic Resource Publisher
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