Hawaii’s lexicon of winds is surely America’s richest, but it isn’t entirely alone. Chicago has the evocatively named Hawk wind, and the Great Lakes have the Witch of November, notorious for sinking the freighter Edmund Fitzgerald, with the loss of all 29 men aboard, in November 1975. Gore Vidal named “Williwaw,” his first novel, for the Aleutian Islands’ bitter blasts. But the most famous North American wind is undoubtedly the Chinook (co-marketed with a salmon, a helicopter and New Hampshire’s state dog).

What is the future of named winds? Dr. Jankovic says climate change may strengthen some, weaken others, and make others “more nomadic.” In Nigeria, climatologists have linked recent disruptions of the Harmattan to climate change. Will the cultural character of a named wind adapt with the weather? Or will the names of some changed winds be forgotten, artifacts of a former climate?

Other wind names, conversely, may become more important, especially if wind-driven disasters like dust storms, wildfires and even nuclear accidents grow more common. And climate change may conjure entirely new winds. Proposals to geo-engineer cooler sea breezes for Tokyo, for example, practically demand a great name.

If few Americans outside California know their local winds by name, perhaps our mobility is partly to blame. To name a wind is to live somewhere long enough to know a place intimately.

Still, ours is an age that venerates all things local. Could named local winds be ready for an American renaissance?

There are tantalizing precedents. A 1997 contest in Portland, Ore., that might today be mistaken for an episode of “Portlandia” invited suggestions for the “cold and crazy” east wind from the Columbia River Gorge. The winner was Coho; memorable losers included Columbia Screamer, Brutal Bellows and Big Bad Momma.

What about jet streams? As a pilot, may I suggest we ennoble something other than jets? The aviator Wiley Post chronicled these high, fast winds that speed or impede us. The first pilot to fly solo around the world, he died in the Alaskan crash that killed Will Rogers. “Folks, flight time to Raleigh is just four hours today, thanks to the Post Winds.” I like it.