James Rodger Fleming is a leading authority on weather, climate, and human affairs. He has served as a contributing author and expert reviewer for the IPCC. He is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Meteorological Society. Awards include the Eduard Brückner Prize for interdisciplinary climate research and the Sally Hacker and Louis J. Battan book prizes. He studied astronomy and atmospheric science before earning his Ph.D. in history from Princeton University. He enjoys fishing, good jazz, good BBQ, seeing students flourish, and, of course, watching clouds. Motto: "Everything is unprecedented if you don't study history."

• Introduction 1: Dark Clouds at Dawn 2: Chicago 3: Woods Hole 4: The Path to Hot Towers 5: UCLA 6: NOAA 7: Virginia 8: NASA 9: Breaking Through Notes 10: Bibliography Index

When Joanne Simpson (1923-2010) was awarded the Carl-Gustaf Rossby Research Medal in 1983, she was the first woman to win the award. The American Meteorological Society praised her outstanding studies of tropical convective clouds and her decades long research on hot towers and hurricanes, which had transformed scientists' understanding of the global circulation of heat. But her mother was unimpressed. "Everyone wonders why, if you are so good," she sniped, "that you have not yet been elected to the National Academy." That tension animates James Rodger Fleming's gripping biography, First Woman: Joanne Simpson and the Tropical Atmosphere.

James Rodger Fleming is a leading authority on weather, climate, and human affairs. He has served as a contributing author and expert reviewer for the IPCC. He is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Meteorological Society. Awards include the Eduard Brückner Prize for interdisciplinary climate research and the Sally Hacker and Louis J. Battan book prizes. He studied astronomy and atmospheric science before earning his Ph.D. in history from Princeton University. He enjoys fishing, good jazz, good BBQ, seeing students flourish, and, of course, watching clouds. Motto: "Everything is unprecedented if you don't study history."

• Introduction 1: Dark Clouds at Dawn 2: Chicago 3: Woods Hole 4: The Path to Hot Towers 5: UCLA 6: NOAA 7: Virginia 8: NASA 9: Breaking Through Notes 10: Bibliography Index

When Joanne Simpson (1923-2010) was awarded the Carl-Gustaf Rossby Research Medal in 1983, she was the first woman to win the award. The American Meteorological Society praised her outstanding studies of tropical convective clouds and her decades long research on hot towers and hurricanes, which had transformed scientists' understanding of the global circulation of heat. But her mother was unimpressed. "Everyone wonders why, if you are so good," she sniped, "that you have not yet been elected to the National Academy." That tension animates James Rodger Fleming's gripping biography, First Woman: Joanne Simpson and the Tropical Atmosphere.

James Rodger Fleming is a leading authority on weather, climate, and human affairs. He has served as a contributing author and expert reviewer for the IPCC. He is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Meteorological Society. Awards include the Eduard Brückner Prize for interdisciplinary climate research and the Sally Hacker and Louis J. Battan book prizes. He studied astronomy and atmospheric science before earning his Ph.D. in history from Princeton University. He enjoys fishing, good jazz, good BBQ, seeing students flourish, and, of course, watching clouds. Motto: "Everything is unprecedented if you don't study history."

• Introduction 1: Dark Clouds at Dawn 2: Chicago 3: Woods Hole 4: The Path to Hot Towers 5: UCLA 6: NOAA 7: Virginia 8: NASA 9: Breaking Through Notes 10: Bibliography Index

When Joanne Simpson (1923-2010) was awarded the Carl-Gustaf Rossby Research Medal in 1983, she was the first woman to win the award. The American Meteorological Society praised her outstanding studies of tropical convective clouds and her decades long research on hot towers and hurricanes, which had transformed scientists' understanding of the global circulation of heat. But her mother was unimpressed. "Everyone wonders why, if you are so good," she sniped, "that you have not yet been elected to the National Academy." That tension animates James Rodger Fleming's gripping biography, First Woman: Joanne Simpson and the Tropical Atmosphere.