Modern weather forecasts owe their existence to the eclectic group of 19th-century mavericks who created meteorological science; they included such figures as Sir Francis Beaufort, who quantified winds, the pharmacist Luke Howard, who classified clouds, and Admiral Robert FitzRoy, who issued Britain’s first storm warning in 1861. This book describes how they developed their radical theories, devised new instruments and attempted to convince governments of the moral duty to give the public advance warning of storms.