Although there had been significant developments in meteorology in the 18th century, Matthew Fontaine Maury, of the US Navy, was instrumental in convening the first truly International Meteorological Conference in Brussels in August 1853. I have paid tribute to the efforts of Maury and his English collaborator, Admiral Robert FitzRoy, in an earlier publication (Gibbs, 1975).

Maury's initiative was followed by an agreement at an International Meteorological Conference in Vienna in September 1873 that an International Meteorological Organization (IMO) should be formed. The members of that Organization were the directors of meteorological services, whereas the members of the WMO are the governments of countries whose Permanent Representatives are usually the directors of the meteorological services of those countries.

My first involvement with overseas meteorologists occurred during the war when I served with General Kenney's Allied Air Headquarters in Brisbane from 1942 to 1944. Contact with meteorologists of the US Navy and US Air Force and with John A Day, a meteorologist working for Pan American Airlines, made me aware of the benefits to be derived from discussions with colleagues from other countries. Group Captain H. N. Warren, as head of the RAAF Meteorological Service, worked closely with senior meteorologists in the various Allied armed forces in coordinating provision of meteorological services for military operations in the South-west Pacific. I believe this was his first contact with overseas meteorologists.

Bureau of Meteorology