What was done
Historical records were used to reconstruct hurricane damage regimes for an area composed of the six New England states plus adjoining New York City and Long Island for the period 1620-1997.

What was learned
In the words of the authors, "there was no clear century-scale trend in the number of major hurricanes."  At lower damage levels, however, fewer hurricanes were recorded in the 17th and 18th centuries than in the 19th and 20th centuries; but Boose et al. note that "this difference is probably the result of improvements in meteorological observations and records since the early 19th century."  Hence, confining ourselves to the better records of the last 200 years, we note that the cooler 19th century had five of the highest-damage F3 category storms, while the warmer 20th century had only one such storm.

What it means
The observed tendency for more extreme hurricanes in cooler times than in warmer times is just the opposite of what climate alarmists generally predict, when they warn of more extreme weather accompanying global warming.  In response to the global warming experienced when the earth rebounded from the global chill of the Little Ice Age, for example, this study of the New England states depicts a dramatic decline in the number of major hurricanes.  Hence, it gives us one more reason to reject the unfounded claims of those who rail against anthropogenic CO2 emissions, which also rose dramatically during this period of declining major hurricanes.