Continued from Part 2, this part provides access to the Greenland Ranch climate forms beginning in 1922.
The observer from 1921 to 1927 was Victoriano Ceballos. Victor did not provide set-max data, and his handwriting was poor. Combined with some of the so-so quality of the reproductions available (via the NCDC web site) of the original climate forms, the result is great difficulty in deciphering some (many?) of his daily max and min temperature entries. I feel much empathy for the person who had to sum up and average the Greenland Ranch maximums and minimums during the 1920s. It was not easy to decipher some of Denton’s entries, but those by Ceballos were even worse. I suspect that some of the average daily maximums and minimums for this period are off by a little bit (in the official database) because some entries are so ambiguous. The Greenland Ranch daily temperatures were not published in Climatological Data for California until about the late 1930s, thus the researcher of Death Valley temperatures (i.e., me and you) must contend with these original hand-written forms, where some nines look like fours and vice versa, some zeros look like ones, some eights look like nines, etc., etc.; and some numbers look like hen scratching and all one can do is make a guess.
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Greenland Ranch climate forms for 1922
Jan 1922 GR Feb 1922 GR Mar 1922 GR Apr 1922 GR May 1922 GR Jun 1922 GR
Jul 1922 GR Aug 1922 GR Sept 1922 GR Oct 1922 GR Nov 1922 GR Dec 1922 GR
In Jan 1922, 18 of the 31 maximums end in a “5” or a “0”. I thought that that problem would be over and done once Denton was replaced. It was determined (or presumed) by me that Denton estimated many daily temperatures when he missed taking the observations, and that he had a strong tendency to enter values which ended in a “5” or a “0”. Did Ceballos do the same thing? Fortunately, this “5” and “0” issue does not appear to continue after February (when 12 of the 28 maximums ended in a “5” or “0”). Perhaps Denton trained Ceballos as to what to do if an observation was missed, and he suggested that entering values ending in a “5” or a “0” was a good idea. Who knows? It is strange. Anyhow, I doubt that the January temperature data for Greenland Ranch are good.
I have not compared the GR 1922 data versus other stations. There is a period from late May to early August with problematic minimums. June minimums appear much too high late in the month. July minimums range from 100F to 110F (i.e., they are much too high) and are “lined out” on the form. The reviewer of the data accurately dismissed the minimums as garbage. A note on the July form states: “min temps untrustworthy, as min thermometer was out of order.” This was initialed by “AHP.” Minimums appear to be much more reliable after about August 3, but there is no notation that the minimum thermometer was repaired or replaced.
Unfortunately, it must be reported here: Victor Ceballos entered temperature data which were very flawed and obviously problematic. The average daily max and mins for July, 1922, according to his entries, were 118.9F and 106.7F. These values result in an absurdly small average daily range of 12 degrees for July 1922. Would not a good observer know that the minimums were way out of whack? It would appear that Ceballos was not one to provide a solid and trustworthy climate record for Greenland Ranch, based on the problems I see during 1922. I figure that the recurring issues and problems with the minimum thermometer were the primary culprit, and Ceballos either did not notice the problem quickly, or did not know what to do regarding the problem, or both.
Greenland Ranch climate forms for 1923
Jan 1923 GR Feb 1923 GR Mar 1923 GR Apr 1923 GR May 1923 GR Jun 1923 GR
Jul 1923 GR Aug 1923 GR Sep 1923 GR Oct 1923 GR Nov 1923 GR Dec 1923 GR
With Ceballos as observer this year, there are a couple of fairly obvious problems to report.
A minimum of 110F is entered for September 8th. Here are the dailies for Sept 7 to 9, 1923:
Sept 7) 119/81
Sept 8) 118/110
Sept 9) 120/81
The highest minimum for the first ten days of this September was 87F, except for the 110F on the 8th. The minimum of 110F is very likely not authentic, as minimums as high as 105F are extremely rare even in July and August. Other low temperatures on the 8th were 60F at Beatty, 70F at Pahrump, 64F at Las Vegas, 70F at Independence and 72F at Trona. Both Trona and Greenland Ranch show clear skies for the 7th through the 9th. There is no evidence and no support for such a warm minimum at Greenland Ranch on the 8th. The Western Region Climate Center stats for Greenland Ranch (1911-1961) indicates that all daily record high minimums for September are 100F or lower, except for the 110F minimum on September 8, 1923. In my opinion, the WRCC should AXE this 110F minimum!
The data for 1923 look pretty darn good until we get to December. Ceballos may have been away from the ranch for a while, as there is a lengthy stretch where the maximums look contrived. From December 10-24, all of the maximums were 60F, 65F, 67F, and 70F. Most of the minimums were clustered around 35F. Do you believe that 15 consecutive maximums consisted of only those four temperatures? I don’t. The maximums at Trona, ranging from 49F to 65F from the 10th to the 24th, are not particularly supportive of the Greenland Ranch maximums as the daily trends show a poor match. I hope that Victor had a nice two weeks off to visit his family during the holiday season.
Greenland Ranch climate forms for 1924
GR Jan 1924 GR Feb 1924 GR Mar 1924 GR Apr 1924 GR May 1924 GR Jun 1924
GR Jul 1924 GR Aug 1924 GR Sep 1924 GR Oct 1924 GR Nov 1924 GR Dec 1924
The climate forms for 1924 were signed by Victor Ceballos from January to September and by Louis Ceballos from October to December.
The temperatures for 1924 look quite reasonable…until the first part of August. Once again, it appears that temperatures were estimated for an extended stretch, perhaps while Ceballos took a break from the relentless summer heat. From August 11-30, the minimum temperature was 100F on 13 occasions, and 110F on two dates! Three other minimums were 95, 95, and 90F. The zeros and fives are back, and that means suspect data. The Greenland Ranch maximums during this stretch look reasonable, and they match the trend of ups and downs versus the Trona maximums. So, maybe the minimum thermometer was again acting up, and Ceballos was at the ranch and doing his best as the observer. Nevertheless, the minimums for August, 1924, are largely junk.
September minimums suffered similarly. It looks like the minimum thermometer continued to have problems and Ceballos was guessing at the low temperatures, often using values that ended in a zero or a five (17 of the 30 minimums). From September 21 to 28, when maximums ranged from 94F to 112F, the run of minimums was 45, 41, 60, 45, 80, 75, 70 and 45F. Death Valley minimums do not jump around this much day-to-day, and the Trona minimums do not support the big swings. Unusually large daily ranges at Greenland Ranch during September, 1924, are somewhat supported by the Trona data, but a handful, such as the 112/45 for a range of 67 degrees on the 28th, are very doubtful.
Three consecutive minimums of 100F from September 1-3 are also suspect, coming soon after the long stretch of bad minimums during August. The WRCC shows those three “100s” as the highest minimums on record for Greenland Ranch for those first three days of September. Trona minimums were 70-75F and do not lend support.
Daily ranges continued quite large into October. The average daily range was 45.8 degrees! Given the minimum temperature problems in August and for at least a part of September, it is very difficult to determine as to whether all or most of the October minimums are authentic. More than half of the minimums of October, 1924, hold the record for lowest minimum for October dates at Greenland Ranch (according to the WRCC tables)! Minimums of 32F were recorded for October 11, 12 and 13 (while highs were 81F to 86F). These are unusually large daily ranges. If we can assume that the minimum thermometer was functioning properly (which is a shaky assumption), then it could be that the instrumentation was very close to or above a very moist ground cover. This would be similar to 1911 to early 1913, when the Greenland Ranch instrumentation was installed right next to the alfalfa field and above a grassy patch (and when average daily ranges were very large compared to later years). There was a visit by the USWB to the Greenland Ranch station in March of 1924 (see Part 6 of this study), and the photographs from this visit show the shelter at the original shelter site, adjacent to the alfalfa field. It seems somewhat reasonable to hypothesize that the thermometer shelter was moved back to this original location a little bit prior to the USWB visit in March 1924. It is also (very slightly!) possible that the USWB instigated a move of the shelter back to its original spot in March 1924, though such a move was not documented.
So, to summarize a little on this —- The instrumentation was just adjacent to the alfalfa field and above a moist patch of grass during its first two years, approximately. The moist environment promoted very large daily ranges. Daytime maximums are generally a couple (a few?) degrees cooler here due to the evaporative cooling effects. However, much less mixing at night (more common during the cool season) can cause a tremendous amount of cooling just above moist surfaces versus above the typical dry desert surface, and thus promote much lower minimums comparably. During the timeframe around 1920, plus-or-minus a few years at least, pictures of the shelter show it nowhere near any cultivated field. Here, there would be little or no cooling due to evaporation near moist ground and vegetation. Minimums averaged much higher at this “dry” shelter site, and daily ranges were significantly smaller on average. By autumn of 1924, the return of the very large daily ranges indicates that something changed. The shelter may have been recently moved from the dry locale to the original moist locale. Or, intense irrigation and cultivation commenced again near the instrumentation (at its original locale) following a period where the immediate area had not been cultivated. Or, the minimum thermometer continued to be problematic and many or most or all of the minimums are too low. Or, a combination of these! A frequent problem with these minimum thermometers is that the alcohol tended to separate, with some alcohol slowly collecting in the top end of the thermometer. The “loss” of alcohol in the main stem of the thermometer caused lower readings than it should. The Substation History documentation for Greenland Ranch shows numerous instances when this “separation” in the minimum thermometer was removed. This “fix” tended to last a little while, but soon the slow process would start again. Anyhow, the Greenland Ranch minimums were undoubtedly bad in August, 1924, so even though they don’t look too bad in September and October, the exceptionally large daily ranges again cast doubt upon the minimums. The very dry atmosphere and the nearby moist field, perhaps alternating moist and dry, moist and dry, could indeed cause big bumps one way or the other on minimums which would be very difficult to explain without knowing the exact status of the nearby farmland.
If you are researching long-term temperature trends at a station, then keep in mind that minimum temperatures in the old days were made with these thermometers which frequently had this separation problem. The thermometer promoted readings which could be consistently a degree or two or three too low until the problem was remedied. Nowadays, with the fancy electronic equipment, such a problem is not going to happen! Any observed warming in the longterm minimum temperature trend could be due to changes in ground cover, changes in instrumentation or station site, a general increase in urbanization near the station, and perhaps due to minimum thermometer issues early in the record.
The unusually large daily temperature ranges of late October, 1924, come to a screeching halt by the start of November. The temperature data for November and December look downright normal. (A change in observers occurred from September to October —– did this change lead to a more trustworthy temperature record by November??) A very cold minimum of 19F was recorded on December 27th.
Greenland Ranch climate forms for 1925
GR Jan 1925 GR Feb 1925 GR Mar 1925 GR Apr 1925 GR May 1925 GR Jun 1925
GR Jul 1925 GR Aug 1925 GR Sep 1925 GR Oct 1925 GR Nov 1925 GR Dec 1925
The climate forms for 1925 were signed by Louis Ceballos in January, and by Victor Ceballos in April and September through December. The remaining forms were unsigned. The handwriting in February and March is close to that of Louis Ceballos, as is that for July. The June and August forms look similar to forms filled out by Victor.
Good news: the Greenland Ranch temperature data appear to be problem-free for all of 1925! (I did not check the maximums against a nearby station, such as Trona, however.) Average daily ranges “ranged” from a low of 27.8 degrees in November to a high of 32.5 degrees in both March and October. This rather narrow and consistent range of average daily range through the year signifies, or at least “suggests,” that the equipment was probably functioning as intended, the nature of the ground cover near and beneath the station did not change (or did not change much — it was probably mostly dry), and the observers provided a trustworthy record. A minimum of 100F on August 4 may be bogus. For whatever reason, minimums of 100F seem to pop up a lot more than would be expected with Victor Ceballos as observer. Why not 99F? Why not 101F? I don’t know, but when such warm minimums and nice round values such as 100F show up, the flashing lights go on. Highs before and after the low of 100F (on the 3rd and 4th) were 115F and 119F, respectively.
Very cool maximums of 78F and 74F were observed at Greenland Ranch on June 5 and 6, respectively. These are the only maximums of under 80F here for all Junes from 1911 to 1960. Keep in mind, though, that with an observation time around 5 p.m., as at Greenland Ranch for most of its period of record, that many cool days which followed warm days would wind up with a maximum temperature which reflected conditions at observation time on the day prior. In other words, a day on which the daytime maximum temperature actually only reached 60F might show a maximum of 70F because the temperature was 70F when the maximum thermometer was reset on the day prior. Thus, there are likely plenty of coolish days which “fall under the radar” due to the late afternoon time of observation. By the way, the only sub-80F June maximum at the Death Valley station (1961-2020) was a 79F maximum on June 14, 1997. The low maximums of 78F and 74F at Greenland Ranch on the 5th and 6th are supported by the chilly highs of 56F and 55F at Beatty on the same two days. Tonopah had a max temp of only 48F on June 5.
Greenland Ranch climate forms for 1926
GR Jan 1926. GR Feb 1926 GR Mar 1926 GR Apr 1926 GR May 1926 GR Jun 1926
GR Jul 1926 GR Aug 1926 GR Sep 1926 GR Oct 1926 GR Nov 1926 GR Dec 1926
All of the forms for 1926 were signed by Victor Ceballos. As usual, the set-max temperature data were not provided. Observation time remained at 5 p.m. The January temperatures look to be filled in by someone other than Victor, based on the handwriting.
I don’t see any obvious problems with the 1926 temperature data. The average daily ranges were very typical, from a low of 24.8 degrees in April to a high of 33.8 degrees in September. These are relatively “moderate” daily ranges, not too dissimilar to current daily ranges at Death Valley, and suggest that there was little or no cooling influence from irrigation and farming at the ranch. Though the instruments were adjacent to the farmland, it seems likely that any heavy irrigation and crop development was not particularly close-by.
The max temp on one very hot day caught my eye as a possible error. The monthly max temp for August is given as 124F on the 24th. The entry for the 24th is not well-written, and the “4” is somewhat dubious. Is it really a “121” or something else? I don’t know. But, the run of maximums from the 22nd to the 26th…
118, 117, 124, 119, 117
…is a little unusual as the jump up seven degrees to 124F and then down to 119F does not conform to a typical summertime heat wave pattern. Typically, the hottest day of the month is flanked by days which are nearly as hot, perhaps within about 2-4 degrees of the maximum temperature for the hottest day. Also during this stretch, minimums were 75 to 78F, except for a minimum of 71F on the 24th. This gave the 24th an extremely large diurnal range of 53 degrees! (This evokes shades of July 1913, when the dubious record hot streak with the 130F-plus days had daily ranges of 45 to 50 degrees.) Max and min temps at other stations for the 24th provide mediocre support for the large daily range and for the high of 124F at Greenland Ranch:
Independence 100/57, Haiwee 98/64, Trona 109/67, Needles 112/71, Indio 113/73, Beatty 98/56, Las Vegas 106/65, Tonopah 90/68, Mina 95/55
Beatty had a max of 105F on the 23rd, so I have a hunch that their entries were a day off (i.e., the 105F was actually on the 24th).
The maximums at surrounding stations support a Greenland Ranch maximum of close to 120F, and not 124F.
The second-highest max temp for August 1926 at Greenland Ranch is the 119F on the 14th and 25th.
So, is the 124F at GR on the 24th authentic, and is the daily range of 53 degrees authentic? I don’t know. This one is 50-50. I can’t wait for the Cow Creek daily temps to commence, but those are still 9 years off in the future!
Greenland Ranch climate forms for 1927
GR Jan 1927 GR Feb 1927 GR Mar 1927 GR Apr 1927 GR May 1927 GR Jun 1927
GR Jul 1927 GR Aug 1927 GR Sep 1927 GR Oct 1927 GR Nov 1927 GR Dec 1927
Uh oh — The curse of the minimum thermometer returns in 1927 at Greenland Ranch. Victor Ceballos signed the forms for January through November, and W.F. Murphees signed the December form. I am not sure if I have the last few letters of Murphees’ name correct, as the signature is not easy to decipher. And speaking of deciphering, again, many of the entries during 1927 are very difficult to discern. Many of the numerals scribbled by Ceballos are easily mistaken for different numerals, if one can even make out a numeral as it is. The poor quality of many of the climate form reproductions is also part of the problem here. Set max temps were not provided, unfortunately, as sometimes knowing this value will help in figuring out the maximum. Observation time was 5 p.m. in 1927. Did poor Victor have electricity and air conditioning yet? Or maybe a swamp cooler?
A look at the January maximums causes a little heartburn. All but one of the first 30 maximums range from 64F to 72F. This is an awfully narrow range of maximums for four consecutive weeks in midwinter. But, a quick look at the maximums at Trona show pretty much the same narrow range of maximums during the same January. I can’t throw this month under the bus!
Average daily ranges start to diminish from February to April, and by the end of April there are some obviously bad (too high) minimums. Of course, relatively small average daily ranges can occur in Death Valley when a month is unusually cloudy, rainy, and/or windy. There are no indications that such conditions prevailed during these months, however. I took a look at Trona’s record in March. It shows high temps of 84F on the 23rd, 24th and 25th. This is around the spring equinox and the sun is high enough for good afternoon mixing, and Trona shows clear to partly cloudy skies. So, Death Valley, almost 2000 feet lower than Trona, should be in the 90s, right? Nope, according to the record. Ceballos entered highs of 71, 77 and 65F for these dates at Greenland Ranch. How could Trona be so much warmer? Nearby Beatty and Clay City, to the northeast of Greenland Ranch (and a little higher in elevation than Trona), show highs of 79F to 82F for the three days. It would appear that the Greenland Ranch temperature reports for the 23rd to 25th are junk.
Many minimums appear to be far too warm during the last two weeks of April, 1927. In fact, according to the WRCC climate page for Greenland Ranch, the month holds the records for warmest minimums for the dates of April 24 to 28th (and 30th). Here are the daily temps for April 24 to 28:
24) 102/99
25) 108/100
26) 108/89
27) 100/98
28) 108/88
It looks like a minimum of 86 or 80F on the GR form to me for the 28th, but the WRCC page shows 88F. Anyway, there are three dates here with absurdly small daily ranges at Greenland Ranch. On the 25th, Beatty (92/44) and Clay City (98/50) had daily ranges of 48 degrees! Why did Greenland Ranch have only 8 degrees? Well, the max temp of 108F for the day looks very legitimate. The minimums are WAY out of whack. Bad minimums started by April 19th, it appears, when 90/80 was entered. Again, the closest stations support the high temp, but not the low temp. My guess is that the minimum thermometer was again problematic, and the observer was either using a problematic thermometer to determine the lows, or he was estimating the minimums somehow. Given the diminishing daily ranges from February through April, and given the obviously bad reports in March and April, it would seem prudent to deem all three months as having unreliable temperatures. A close comparison should be made with the surrounding stations before accepting ANY of the Greenland Ranch temperature data for February, March and April of 1927.
For May, again the average daily range (22.9 degrees) is quite low, and a handful of days show minimums which are probably much too high. Without knowing the wind and overnight sky conditions it is difficult to know for certain, but minimum temperatures are usually 25 to 35 degrees lower than previous sunny-day maximums at Furnace Creek. On May 16th, the high was 111F, and the next morning low was 96F. The high on the 17th was 102F. Could these be legitimate temperatures? Yes, they could, if it was quite windy all night to help keep the lower atmosphere well-mixed and to keep the minimum temperature very warm. The mid-May hot spell was quite impressive for mid-May, so let’s take a look at it, compared to temps at Trona, Clay City and Beatty:
Max and mins, May 12-18, 1927
GR
12) 108/85
13) 110/87
14) 114/88
15) 118/81
16) 111/79
17) 102/96
18) 100/75
Summer daily ranges look okay, though July’s average daily range of 25.4 degrees is rather small. Eleven minimums in July were exactly 100F. None were higher than 100F. With a dozen maximums of 120F to 124F, it might just be that lots of minimums were only 100F. But to have so many minimums at exactly 100F is at least a LITTLE suspect.
August minimums look a bit high, and the average daily range is 27.2 degrees. September daily ranges average 32.7 and October’s average is 44.1 degrees. This large swing in daily ranges from summer to fall is, again, possible…but I tend to think that there is a problem or two going on. A quick look at November shows nothing obvious, but December has problems. Eight minimums in a row are 23F late in the month, with an even longer stretch of maximums from only 59F to 60F! Given that a new observer signed this form, I think that Victor left Greenland Ranch for the Christmas holidays and a couple of weeks worth of daily temperatures are estimated.
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