Abstract
ON AUGUST 6, occurs the centenary of the birth of the distinguished meteorologist George James Symons, in whose honour the Symons Medal of the Royal Meteorological Society was founded. Born in Queen's Row, Pimlico, he was educated at St. Peter's School,- Eaton Square, London, and at Thornton Rectory, Leicestershire, and passed through the Royal School of Mines. Having joined the British Meteorological Society in 1856, the following year he undertook the duties of meteorological reporter to the Registrar-General, and these he continued to discharge until his death. For three years, 1860–63, he also served under Rear-Admiral Robert FitzRoy in the Meteorological Department of the Board of Trade, which had been inaugurated in 1857. His services to meteorological science were many and varied. In 1860 he published the first volume of his "British Rainfall", which gave rise to the British Rainfall Organization, the work of which was transferred to the Meteorological Office in 1919, and in 1866 he founded Symon's Meteorological Magazine, which in 1920, with the Meteorological Office Circular, was incorporated with the Meteorological Magazine. For two periods he served as honorary secretary to the Royal Meteorological Society, and in 1880 and 1900 was the president. So early as 1876 he received a Telford premium from the Institution of Civil Engineers for a paper on floods and water economy, and in 1897 he was awarded the Albert Medal of the Royal Society of Arts for the service he had rendered engineers engaged on water supply problems. His death took place on March 10, 1900, and he was buried in Kensal Green Cemetery. The following year a fund of more than £700 was subscribed for founding the Medal bearing his name.
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George James Symons, F.R.S. (1838–1901). Nature 142, 244 (1938). https://doi.org/10.1038/142244c0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/142244c0