Are you in heat? Remember the ‘misery index’

The air conditioning is out at our offices and the engineers tell us it may be awhile before it returns to duty. Suffice to say it’s hot here, because this is Washington, D.C., after all, at the start of summer.

And about 14 percent of the total civilian workforce is based in the D.C. metropolitan area. Many of them believe they work in the hottest and most humid of Uncle Sam’s stateside outposts.

Some also believe this is the allergy capital of the nation, that we have the worst drivers and traffic outside of Bangkok, and that the one-finger salute is our salutation-of-choice. But how hot is it where you live?

Local legends says that at one-time, the British Embassy moved most of its staff to New England each summer and paid a tropical allowance to those who remained in this one-time swamp. But it is true that some federal civil servants from Houston and New Orleans beg for temporary assignments to their Washington headquarters because of our comparatively dry climate.

Feds who work in Las Vegas and El Paso, Memphis and Little Rock long for our relatively cool breezes in summertime. Up until the mid-1970s the government here and in other cities used what was called the “misery index” — once indoor temperatures hit a certain temperature and humidity level, feds in that building were dismissed.

The problem was where the temperature-humidity index reading was taken. Many bosses in those days had window air conditioning units that worked but often employees had to resort to fans, or open windows. Often they would remove their ties, which, in olden days people wore.

A reader sent me a clip of a 1994 Federal Diary column I did for The Washington Post which reads in part:

“If you were reading this column on a 100-degree day 20 years ago, you would be doing it in the comfort of your home rather than on the way to, or at, the office. Alas, feds suffering the heartbreak of prickly heat on days with triple-digit temperatures no longer have the Misery Index to fall back on.

“For many years, sweltering feds watched the index (listing unacceptable indoor temperatures and humidity levels) like serious gamblers watch the lottery drawing. Senators don’t think Pentagon has moved quickly enough on military health care reforms.

“When the Misery Index indoor levels registered, bingo, it was time to go home…”

That reminds me of the Gettysburg Address — short, yet brilliant, and it just gets better with time. But I digress.

Another hot-under-the-collar fed sent the following:

“Older feds like myself will remember the days in D.C. back in the [1960s] and earlier when many government buildings, other than executives’ offices with their own [air conditioning] window units, were not air conditioned, and fans were ubiquitous, as were openable windows.

“However, under guidelines put out in those bygone days by the old Civil Service Commission, workers had to be dismissed once indoor wet bulb temperature readings reached dangerously high levels. [I] have searched for but couldn’t find the old maximum temperature policy guidance to jog my memory as to the exact indoor maximum temperature number that had to be reached. Believe me, things in the ‘good old pre-A/C, in most federal offices, summertime’ … weren’t.” — WTR

Bottom line: It’s summertime wherever you work which, despite what people tell you, isn’t the worst place to be. Enjoy it while you can.

Nearly Useless Factoid

By Amelia Brust

Sources: Google patents

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