All summer Sula Valley cattlemen had burned extra candles to the Virgin, and had spoken bluntly to their patron saint. Such measures had once been credited with bringing 100 inches of rain a year, but since January only five inches had fallen. Shoulder-high grass turned brown, and the scrawny, tick-infested cattle fell dead of starvation.
The United Fruit Co., whose banana plantings cover a third of the valley, had had better luck with its rainmaking methods. The company's Texas-bred pilot, stocky Joe M. Silverthorne, did the trick by dropping Dry Ice pellets into passing clouds.
When a hard-pressed cattleman commented, "La...
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