People's Pilot, Volume 3, Number 13, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 September 1893 — WELCOME RAIN. [ARTICLE]

WELCOME RAIN.

A Drought That Had Made a Record Finally Broken. Chicago, Sept 13.—Tuesday’s rain ended the drought in Chicago that had entered upon its eighty-fifth day. Showers are reported throughout the state and to the east and west. At the weather bureau rains were reported in Grand Haven, Mich.; Jacksonville, Fla.; Louisville, Ky.; Pittsburgh, Pa., and Springfield, 111. The temperature was that of July. At Abeline, Kan., the maximum registered was 104 degrees. In some parts of Texas the thermometer registered 112 degrees in the shade. Columbus, 0., Sept 13.—Weather Observer McDonough says the recent drought, broken for the first time Tuesday by rain, has been the longest since the location of the signal station in this city in 1879. For eighty-six days, with the exception of a passing shower on the 27th of August, there has been no rain in this vicinity. Indianapolis, Ind., Sept 13. —Not since June 21 has enough rain fallen here to make the gutters run until Monday night, when there came a shower. This was supplemented Tuesday afternoon by a heavy downpour. A steady rain is now falling and is being drunk wp by the parched foliage and suncracked soil, dry as powder for nearly eleven weeks. The weather has been so dry that no fall plowing has been done, while the late maturing crops have been almost .cooked in the earth. Corn has ripened half grown, and potatoes are almost too small to dig. The fields are burned up. Madison, Wis., Sept. 13.—Not a drop of rain since five weeks ago last Friday .is a drought record which has left nearly the whole of southern Wisconsin in a truly critical condition. The terrible condition of northern i Wisconsin, where fierce forest fires are destroying not only valuable l timber but promising towns, is well J known; but that damage, though more , forcefully impressed upon the public, is J hardly equal to the damage by the drought in the southern part of the state. All about Madison, and it is so throughout, the pastures are absolutely dried up and no amount of rain could revive them. A trei mendous crop of hay was cut, but I farmers have already begun to feed it to their stock, which makes them fear the supply will not last through the year. No fall plowing has been done, iwnd it looks as though no winter wheat ean be sown. Tobacco and corn are badly dwarfed and chinch bugs by the billions infest the fields, though they are too late to do a great amount of damage.