CHICOPEE, Mass. (WWLP) – 22News Storm Team Meteorologist Adam Strzempko took a look back at WWLP’s first meteorologist and how forecasting the weather has changed over the years.

22News continues to celebrate our 70th anniversary and back in the early days we didn’t have anything like the technology we have today.

If you grew up watching WWLP you probably remember the station’s very first meteorologist, John Quill. John was even hired before the station first went on the air back on March 17, 1953. Back in the early days, John did the forecast for both the morning and evening newscasts. The way we presented the weather back in those days was a lot different than we do today.

In the early days before computers and the chroma key wall, John would write on sliding boards using grease markers. Today, our new state-of-the-art studio allows us to do the weather in front of large monitors. There are also a number of other locations in our weather center where we can do the weather from. Our computers and our ESP Live Doppler radar allow our forecasts to be a lot more accurate than they were back in the early days.

John Quill forecasted the weather on WWLP for 47 years and retired in 2000.