In 1849 the Smithsonian established their own weather service. They started with 150 stations mostly focused in the Northeast US. Over the following decade they added more stations, and provided basic forecasting services to the Washington Evening Star, and through them to other newspapers. Several other competing services would be established, notably the Telegraph Service based in Cincinnati.

In 1870 Congress established the U.S. Army Signal Service’s Division of Telegrams and Reports for the Benefit of Commerce which was given the responsibility of collecting weather data and providing reports, basically replacing the earlier Smithsonian and Telegraph Service networks.

In 1890 the functions of the Signal Service were transferred to the U.S. Weather Bureau which was made a subdivision of the Department of Agriculture. Under civilian control the number of reporting stations were greatly expanded. This included setting up a network of hurricane warning stations across the Caribbean and the exchange of data with Canadian weather reporting. These stations were experimenting with new technologies like weather kites and balloons to measure pressure and temperature up to a few miles into the air. But understanding of the upper atmosphere was still rudimentary at best.

By 1899 the Weather Bureau was issuing daily forecasts for most of the country and severe weather warnings, as much as 4-5 days out. For example they did successfully identify and predict the path of the 1900 Galveston Hurricane. Sadly they didn’t predict the severity of the storm surge.

None the less by February 1899 the Weather Bureau had nearly 3000 monitoring sites including sites in Canada, Mexico, and Jamaica. In early February barometric pressures in Canada soared. Swift Current, Assiniboia recorded the highest barometric pressure up to that point in North America. As this extraordinary high pressure zone moved across Canada a series of low pressures moved across the South. From the 1st to 8th the Pacific Northwest was regularly reporting record lows. The extreme cold wave was in Santa Fe by the 10th, New Orleans on the 11th, and the Carolinas and Florida by the 13th, and lasted several days in all locations. Throughout it all the Weather Bureau was reporting data and giving forecasts. It was one the Bureau’s first unqualified successes. It provided accurate and timely predictions, and probably helped save a lot of lives and property.

I’ll let the Abilene West Texas Sentinel sum it up. This editorial taken from February 23rd:

“The freeze was by all odds the severest ever known in this part of Texas. The local Weather Bureau office gave out the forecast twenty-four hours in advance of the arrival here of the cold wave. If everyone interested, and who received or could have received the information, had taken prompt advantage of the warning there is no telling how much saving in the matter of live stock alone would have resulted. As it was many of our stockmen and farmers who have learned to rely largely on the weather forecasts took steps at once to protect their stock from the cold wave they knew was fast approaching. They didn’t act upon the idea that a cold wave might be coming, but they knew it was coming when Mr. Oliver, the Weather Bureau Observer, said so and went to work accordingly and secured their stock. Where the telegraph and telephone could not be used messengers were sent out to warn people to get ready for the cold wave.”

In short, at least according to the paper, the ranchers were by then familiar with forecasts and trusted them. The cold wave was anticipated and along with the official publication in newspapers, the particular cold wave warning was spread by telegraph, telephone, and where necessary in person messengers with 24 hour notice. So not a surprise. Most ranchers in the area wouldn’t have been surprised by the severe cold snap.