The Meteorological Observatory was founded by Father Franceso Denza in 1859 on the model of the Observatory of the Roman College directed by the famous Father Secchi. In 1865, Father Denza conceived the original nucleus of the Italian Meteorological Society, creating a "Corrispondence" involving the exchange of data and information among several Italian observatories.

The center of this network was for more than fifty years the Observatory of Moncalieri, called for this reason "Central", where the "Monthly Bulletin", the first periodical on meteorology in Italy, was published. Following Father Denza's death in 1894, the Observatory continued its activity up until 1951, when its last director, Father Dionigi Boddaert, passed away. In the years that followed there was a notable decline in the institution's scientific production, limited to the taking of temperatures and levels of precipitation under the responsibility of the Hydrographic Office of the Po.

Beginning in 1987, a group of young meteorologists from Turin gave new life to the observatory and to the former Società Meteorologica Italiana (Italian Meteorogical Society). A contribution from the Compagnia di San Paolo made it possible to purchase a new automatic weather station, installed in 2001 (data is available at the Society's web site), and the historical series of the precious observations was published in its entirety in a volume that represents one of the most important points of reference for Italian climatology.