Weather has shaped United States' culture, national character and folklore; at times it has changed the course of history. The seven accounts compiled in this publication highlight some of the nation's weather experiences from the hurricanes that threatened Christopher Columbus to the peculiar run of bad weather that has plagued American presidents on Inauguration Day. Also presented are meteorological phenomena encountered by people who documented weather and climate during the Revolutionary and Civil Wars and those who suffered through the "year without a summer," the Blizzard of '88, and the dustbowl drought of the 1930's. Numerous historical photographs illustrate the entries. (Author/WB).

Native American tales are set against scientific facts to explain how thunder, tornadoes, sunlight, rainbows, and other weather phenomena come into existence.

The author profiles real tornadoes and severe weather patterns over six thousand miles of Oklahoma, Kansas, and Nebraska, known as Tornado Alley.

A kaleidoscopic book that illuminates our obsession with weather--as both physical reality and evocative metaphor--focusing on the ways in which it is perceived, feared, embraced, managed, and even marketed.

From the heart of tornado alley, Smith takes us into the eye of America's most devastating storms and behind the scenes of some of the world's most renowned scientific institutions to uncover the relationship between mankind and the weather.

Nowhere in the world is weather as volatile and powerful as it is in North America. Scorching heat in the Southwest, hurricanes on the Atlantic coast, tornadoes in the Plains, blizzards in the mountains: Every area of the country has vastly different weather, and vastly different cultures as a result. Braving the Elements is David Laskin's delightful and fascinating history of how our unique weather has shaped a nation, and how we've tried to cope with it over centuries. Since before Columbus, the peoples of America have struggled to make sense of the capricious and violent nature of America's weather. Anasazi Indians used the rain dance (and sometimes human sacrifice) to induce rain, while the Puritans in New England blamed the sins of the community for lightening strikes and Nor'easters. IN modern times we carry on those traditions by blaming the weatherman for ruined weekends. Despite hi-tech satellites and powerful computers and 24-hour-a-day forecasting from The Weather Channel, we're still at the mercy of the whims of Mother Nature. Laskin recounts the many dramatic moments in American weather history, from the "Little Ice Age" to Ben Franklin's invention of the lightning rod to the Great Blizzard of the 1930's to the worries about global warming. Packed with fresh insights and wonderful lore and trivia, Braving the Elements is unique and essential reading for anyone who's ever asked, "What's it like outside?"