Haha, I bet the WTS wishes those articles would disappear. They tended to reflect the crazy ideas floating around in the world at that time, and were plucked out and put in a WT publication by the editor of the Awake/Golden Age especially. Most did not survive to today. I found this very interesting when I was doing my research on the flood and past teachings by the WTS. Here is a good Post by VM: "
20 years ago
Isaac Newton Vail wrote some books and pamphlets about
the canopy theory as the source of the waters of the Great
Flood. He published several books and pamphlets describing
his "Earth's Annular Ring" idea, and even published a
magazine called "Annular World".
While Vail may not have been the first to use the Flood myths
of various cultures to prove the existence of a world covering
flood, he probably was the first to use the myths to try and
prove that the Earth was covered by a ring of water.
The Watchtower endorsed Vail's ideas for decades, Rutherford
even wrote that "It seems to have been the plan of Jehovah
God to begin the increase of light upon his great work for
the benifit of man about the year 1874 A.D. It was in that year that
Isaac N. Vail first publihsed a pamphlet entitled 'The Earth's
Annular System'." (page 29, Creation 1927) Rutherford then devotes
about 6 or 7 pages to Vail's Annular theory, even including a
diagram of the earth and it's annular system.
I believe that Vail's ideas even appear in the Watchtower book,
"Paradise" book published in 1959, although Vail is not mentioned
by name in the book.
The Vailian theory was never considered by mainstream science, as
it violated basic laws of orbital mechanics. It appears that
any such cloud canopy containing enough vapor required by the Flood would result in an earth temperature too high to support life.
(Temperate climate indeed!)
After teaching the Vail like ideas about 100 years, all the WT
now says is that "it is best not to speculate." But the WT still
uses cultural Flood myths as an "anthropological" proof for the
Great Flood.
A good web article about the Vailian canopy theory is:
"The Demise and Fall of the Water Vapor Canopy: A Fallen Creationist Idea" by Glenn R. Morton
which may be found at: