Historical Past (1895-1980) - Time series datasets prior to 1981 are modeled using climatologically-aided interpolation (CAI), which uses the long-term average pattern (i.e., the 30-year normals) as first-guess of the spatial pattern of climatic conditions for a given month or day. CAI is robust to wide variations in station data density, which is necessary when modeling long time series. Data is based on Monthly and Annual dataset covering the conterminous U.S. from 1981 to now. Contains spatially gridded monthly and annual total precipitation at 4km grid cell resolution. Distribution of the point measurements to the spatial grid was accomplished using the PRISM model, developed and applied by Dr. Christopher Daly of the PRISM Climate Group at Oregon State University.