Gordon Valentine Manley and his contribution to the study of climate change: a review of his life and work

Abstract

British climatologist and geographer, Gordon Manley (1902Manley ( -1980, is perhaps best known for his pioneering work on climate variability in the UK, for establishing the Central England Temperature series and, for his pivotal role in demonstrating the powerful relationship between climate, weather, and culture in post-World War II Britain. Yet Manley made many contributions, both professional and popular, to climate change debates in the twentieth century, where climate change is broadly understood to be changes over a range of temporal and spatial scales rather than anthropogenic warming per se. This review first establishes how Manley's work, including that on snow and ice, was influenced by key figures in debates over climatic amelioration around the North Atlantic between 1920s and 1950s. His research exploring historical climate variability in the UK using documentary sources is then discussed. His perspectives on the relationship between climate changes and cultural history are reviewed, paying particular attention to his interpretation of this relationship as it played out in the UK. Throughout, the review aims to show Manley to be a fieldworker and an empiricist and reveals how he remained committed to rigorous scientific investigation despite changing trends within his academic discipline.

Epistemology and Politics in Earth System Modeling: Historical Perspectives

“…The primitive equations implied a physical reductionism, which was foreign to the holistic ideal of climatological detail and comprehensiveness, and effectively canceled human affairs out of the equation. Many climatologists neither paid attention to nor understood or trusted the high‐flying theoretical ambitions, approximations, and mathematical manipulations involved in using these equations but rather relied on established empirical evidence (Endfield et al, ; Heymann, , ; Martin Nielsen, ; Martin‐Nielsen, ; Sörlin, ).…”

Contributions and perspectives from geography to the study of climate

“…Manley was perhaps one of the few who dared to continue to explore climate–society relationships in the face of this backlash. Indeed, he praised Huntington for outlining the ways in which climate and society were interlinked not least in the, for him, vigorous British climate that led to industrious citizens . But he argued against Huntington's less specific general conclusions and instead prioritized a locally, geographically specific articulation of the climate–society relationship .…”

Helmut Landsberg and the evolution of 20th century American climatology: envisioning a climatological renaissance

“…Lamb; British meteorologist Gordon Manley; German climatologist Edward Brückner; American climatologist Charles Thornthwaite; British engineer Guy Stewart Callendar; Norwegian physicist Vilhelm Bjerknes; and Norwegian meteorologist Sverre Pettersson. [12][13][14][15][16][17][18] Historian James Fleming has more recently traced the overlapping lives of three of the most prominent names in the evolution of atmospheric science-Vilhelm Bjerknes, Carl Gustaf Rossby, and Harry Wexler-and how their biographies highlighted the strong linkages between American and European atmospheric research between 1862 and 1962. 19 But perhaps the most important reason for analyzing Landsberg's life and role in the development of climatology and geophysics more broadly is to explain his apparent innocuousness.…”

“…Conceived as a geophysical discipline, scholarship on the evolution of climatological thought has expanded significantly to include many noteworthy figures—British climatologist H.H. Lamb; British meteorologist Gordon Manley; German climatologist Edward Brückner; American climatologist Charles Thornthwaite; British engineer Guy Stewart Callendar; Norwegian physicist Vilhelm Bjerknes; and Norwegian meteorologist Sverre Pettersson . Historian James Fleming has more recently traced the overlapping lives of three of the most prominent names in the evolution of atmospheric science—Vilhelm Bjerknes, Carl Gustaf Rossby, and Harry Wexler—and how their biographies highlighted the strong linkages between American and European atmospheric research between 1862 and 1962…”