Weather Watchers Have A Rich History In Colorado

DENVER (CBS4) - One of the first weather stations in Colorado dates back to 1852 at Fort Massachusetts, in an area now known as Fort Garland.

And while weather stations started popping up as Colorado's population grew, they really got a boost in the late 1880s thanks to a math professor at Colorado College.

Frank Herbert Loud had a huge interest in meteorology. He formed the Colorado Meteorological Association in 1886 to establish a network of weather stations that would collect important weather data.

Within just a few years there were 40 weather stations all using the latest in weather instruments.

Soon Loud and fellow weather colleagues started writing publications to educate others about the climate of the Central Rockies.

By the 1920s data from weather stations allowed maps to be created showing the climatology of Colorado, including the average annual precipitation.

Today there are several hundred weather stations that collect daily weather data from around Colorado.