| Show WORLD IN GRIP OF DRY PHASE 9 while we are speculating about the possible causes of dry weather in our own region we may note for whatever it may signify that in england they are giving serious thought to problems caused by falling ot of the water levels in streams a phenomenon that has been developing for a couple or of years now that may be mere coincidence but anthe on the other hand it may suggest that conditions affecting a far wider area than just our group of a halt dozen dozen midwestern mid western states are at work it may be that the areas which now seem to be particularly net not dry such as some parts of the east are ire the exceptions and that either the whole world or at least the northern hemisphere is la in the dry phase of a long time cycle everybody now knows of course that radical climatic changes do take place that the ice fee caps at the poles have advanced and retreated Is proven by the evidence of our hills and valleys and lakes and soil even some of the ancients surmised that there had been great climatic changes in europe by the cold in central and northern europe had greatly moderated but these changes come over such long periods as to mean nothing to any single generation of men whether there really are de definite flatte cycles subject eventually to measurement ur whereby weather conditions vary within a relatively brief period of years says a fifteen year wet to dry cycle or a forty dear wet to dry cycle it not yet known but there seems reason enough for even a nonscientific person to suspect it A hundred years hence when ahen a vastly greater amount of reliable in formation about weather happenings has been gathered in this and other c countries it may be possible to predict the next swing toward dryness and the next swing toward wetness with real accuracy so far as any large area Is cone concerned d meantime we here in towa iowa arne may arsi rest on the fact that drastic changes in climate do not seem ever to come rapidly and that several times in the past tills region has known prolonged dry spells only to emerge again into compensating wet spells nowhere on earth has there been within the period of white mens knowledge a more dependably fa clin late for producing the necessaries of life than in this corn coin belt of which iowa la Is the center des moines tribune |
