One of the earliest descriptions of the global greenhouse effect to appear in the popular media can be found in a 1953 edition of Popular Mechanics. The brief two-paragraph article published more than a half-century ago describes with surprising precision the fundamental workings of a scientific phenomenon that would soon become one of the most intensely studied in human history. The piece explains, “Earth's ground temperature is rising by about 1½ degrees a century as a result of carbon dioxide discharged from the burning of about 2,000,000,000 tons of coal and oil yearly.…This discharge augments a blanket of gas around the world which is raising the temperature in the same manner glass heats a greenhouse”[1]. The article goes on to predict a doubling of atmospheric carbon dioxide levels and a rise in global temperatures of about 4% by 2080, which is not far off the mark from today's best estimates.

That an article from the 1950s could describe with measurable accuracy the workings of a phenomenon that would not be formally acknowledged by the U.S. Academy of Sciences for another several decades is remarkable. Yet perhaps the article's central prescience is suggested by its placement within the magazine, appearing on page 119 of the August edition and trailing a piece titled, “Dutch Entertainer Rides Tiny Bike.” Viewed by the magazine's editors as less newsworthy than a shopworn circus act, the global greenhouse effect and its implications for human life are viewed today by many in a similar light. But this outcome results not from any degree of scientific uncertainty.