Franklin F. Snyder
Q ..
You went to Harrisburg, according to your vita.
A ..
Yes.
Q ..
Okay. So you went to the State Capital. That's where they set up the office to do
that work?
A
Yes. We had the state divided into three sections: the Delaware section, the
Susquehanna, and the Ohio. So I immediately started collecting data with the staff,
getting information together and developing flood forecasting procedures for all
three river basins. They were published by the, well, I don't know whether you'd
call it published or not, but the state printed them. They weren't in a real book
form. They were in a soft book. We had developed flood procedures for the three
major basins.
Pennsylvania has always been a pretty strong political state. Whichever party was
in charge, almost without fail, the employees paid their contributions or they didn't
work. Well, I was assured that I would not be subject to that. We were sort of
winding up the forecasting studies and most of the rain gauges had been installed.
My wife was a secretary in the office of the head of the Forestry Service. But
somehow, they got the word through her to me that they were going to start, that the
Democrats were going to start working on me. I think it was suggested that I resign
rather than get fired.
The Weather Bureau hired me then to go to Pittsburgh and be in charge of
hydrologic services in the Pittsburgh
of the Weather Bureau as a focal point
for floodcasting the Upper Ohio River. They had also suffered severely in that 1936
flood, and so my wife and I moved to Pittsburgh.
Q ..
Okay. So you were in Harrisburg for about two years?
A ..
Yes.
Q ..
Let me ask you about this flood forecasting. Now, that had to be in its very early
years of flood forecasting. What did you use as a basis for developing your
procedures?
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