This is a US Weather Bureau pattern 8-inch copper rain gauge manufactured by WS Jenks in Washington, DC. The date of manufacture is unknown, but it's quite weathered and solder repaired. The steel stand is a modern item sold by NovaLynx. With the stand it’s approximately 33 inches tall.

The 8 inch rain gauge of this design was inherited as the standard manual gauge for the US Weather Bureau from the US Army Signal Service. Cleveland Abbe established the design in his 1887 publication "Treatise on Meteorological Apparatus and Methods", available on this website.

The funnel at the top channels the rain into a 2.53 inch diameter interior tube. This results in a factor of 10 magnification in the amount of rain. A dipstick is used to measure the rain without opening the gauge. If more than 2 inches of rain falls, it overflows the inner tube into the outer tube for separate measurement. This model rain gauge has been in continuous use since the 1800s, particularly for daily rainfall totals from weather bureau cooperative stations. I took readings from the university cooperative station with a gauge like this in the 1970s.

WS Jenks continues in business as a Washington DC hardware supplier.

Download the 1892 US Weather Bureau manual for this rain gauge here (8 pages).