Leonids

The stars falling from the heavens.

Yeah, every 33 years, in fact, since the Leonid meteor showers began a few hundred years ago.

So you might say that the last prophecy age, the last generation, that last biblical day, as the day with Yahweh is like a thousand years with us, that last biblical day, we began to see the fall of the stars from heaven.

Every 33 years, this cyclical so-called meteor shower happens, and there are no meteors.

The final case in Albion occurred on the night of August 10, 2007.

A couple had just stepped outside to watch the Leonids, a meteor shower, when they noticed a group of dim lights moving in the eastern sky, very low, just above treetop level.

These were clearly not meteors.

The wife shouted out, What is that? And her husband thought briefly that this might be a flock of geese.

explaining things that appeal to the senses, so sights, smells, the feeling you get in certain places, and you're transported to these places, you feel like you're there.

On page three, which is the first page of the chapter, night of your birth, 33, the Leonids, they were called, God, how the stars did fall.

I looked for blackness, holes in the heavens, the dipper stove.

I love that section.

A final case in Albion occurred on the night of August 10, 2007.

A couple had just stepped outside to watch the Leonids, a meteor shower, when they noticed a group of dim lights moving in the eastern sky, very low, just above treetop level.

These were clearly not meteors.

The wife shouted out, What is that? And her husband thought briefly that this might be a flock of geese.

And we can, and we can watch the, uh, and watch the meteor shower, and they love it.

But, uh, you know, but I think my favorite one ever was just a few years ago, was the Leonids-

Yes

... which was just like nothing I've ever seen.

You can get hundreds of things per hour, sometimes thousands per hour that you can see.

And it- it's actually even led to songs.

Back in 1833, there was a Leonid m- meteor shower that w- was referred to as it was basically r- raining meteors.

And then again in 1933, there was a fabulous storm that was particularly spectacular in Alabama that led to the writing of a jazz standard called Stars Fell on Alabama.

As far as anyone was concerned, they weren't sky objects at all, just weather.

It took the 1833 Leonid storm to finally overturn that.

Where meteors did get cultural weight in the interim, it usually wasn't as a calendar tool.

It was as a specific kind of warning or defense.

The only anxiety of the zealous was to warn sinners to prepare for the impending annihilation of the earth and to flee from the wrath to come.

such meetings had never been dreamed of the ministers spoke with words that fairly burned the souls of their hearers tongues of men and women heretofore diffident were loosened and they proclaimed the gospel and exhorted with an eloquence and fervor that moved the most stony-hearted and obdurate unbelievers while hundreds of voices mingled in anthems and hymns as they never had before all night long the meetings continued nobody thought of sleep or food or business excitement developed into delirium ordinary avocations were practically forgotten and left to take care of themselves as the news spread people continued to push into town the churches were packed and the village hall was converted into a place of worship but still men women and children stood without clamoring for admittance pastors alternated in exhorting assisted by laymen and so irresistible was the mighty influence that scarcely a soul in the town or surrounding country successfully withstood it soon the news of the discovery of the miraculous message and reports of the marvellous meetings spread from town to town and multitudes from many miles around came to see the wonderful egg all yielding swiftly to the influence of the spell exerted over the public mind the meetings were continued gathering strength and increasing in excitement and numbers people exhorted sang prayed and praised until worn out they sought bed for a few hours sleep hastily swallowing such food as could be prepared with least effort then hurrying back to the meeting places then somebody suggested the erection of a monster building where all might assemble beneath one roof and contributions were called for the response was amazing money literally poured in upon the building committee many well-to-do farmers withdrawing their entire balances from the bank placing the cash at the disposal of the leaders however no funds were required the lumber dealer a prominent church member perhaps feeling at this crisis the need of heavenly credit threw open the gates of his yard and begged the committee to avail itself of his stock while glazed frames of which the acres of market gardens in the vicinity afforded an unlimited supply were utilized as windows and in the construction of the roof hundreds of wrought-up men freely volunteered their services and the unparalleled undertaking of completing a tabernacle between daylight and sundown seemed to be possible the decision was reached at a location determined upon late friday afternoon and at daybreak on saturday november twelfth a score of teams began to transfer the lumber yard to the appointed place where hundreds of stalwart men stood ready to execute the orders of the builders and when they were given worked with desperation born of a conviction that upon the completion of the tabernacle depended their hope of eternal salvation the completed structure was two hundred feet square and twenty feet high a huge box in fact roughly built furnished with plank benches but grandly lighted through its great glass roof the last nail was driven shortly before ten o'clock saturday night and then the exhausted multitude retired to rest the dedicatory services being postponed till sunday then the zealous felt the end was indeed near at hand and the weaker brethren trembled at the idea of gathering in a structure plan on a friday and to be dedicated on the thirteenth of the month throughout all these moving manifestations geoffrey jordan the son of the methodist minister remained unmoved and apathetic and this too in spite of the fact that he had always been an interested member of the sunday school in the upward league his mystified sorrowing father and mother labored vainly day after day to arouse the boy to the danger of his position to the peril of delay finally mrs jordan with maternal intuition divined the existence of a secret in geoffrey's breast that chained him to the world and that would if harboured for ever bar him from the presence of his creator before whose tribunal all the people of the earth must soon appear perhaps that very day and she pleaded in agony with her boy to divulge the cause of his indifference for a long time the son steadfastly denied the possession of a secret but at last broke down beneath the mother's searching questioning and on sunday evening while exciting services were being held in the crowded tabernacle made a full confession mrs jordan was horrified almost to the point of hysteria alternately she wept and reviled herself that it should have fallen to her lot to be the mother of such an infamous creature then becoming calmer she made her way through the dense throng to her husband and whispered a few words to him his face blanched instantly and he staggered as though beneath a violent blow with heroic effort however the minister controlled himself and advancing to the centre of the rude platform where a fellow-pastor wholly unconscious of all earthly surroundings and with soul aflame was lifting his voice in exhortation he gently touched the speaker upon the shoulder then stretching his arm toward the audience as if to implore closest attention and raising his eyes heavenward rev mr jordan opened his lips to speak a solemn hush fell upon the vast concourse all eyes followed those of the pastor and the multitude gazed upward through the great glazed roof then a frantic shout went up women shrieked men groaned and children screamed and wept the whole heavens were seen to be blazing with darting stars the flaming meteors flashed before the terrified eyes of the cowering crowd seemingly as thick as snowflakes in a storm and cries of horror and prayers for mercy drowned every other sound the end of the world had surely come and all who could animated to the last by human instincts and preferring to make their start for the judgment seat in the open air rather than from beneath the ruins of a lumber pile and the debris of broken cucumber frames rushed wildly for the ample barn-like exits a few however remained in their seats and among them the village doctor always regarded suspiciously in the community as too much of a materialist who calmly pushed his way to the group of hysterical clergymen on the platform and there, having secured the attention of his fellow auditors, coolly announced that the phenomena they were witnessing was merely the meteor swarm called by astronomers the Leonids, which returned to the Earth's path once in about thirty-three years, on or near the thirteenth of November.

that was the end of the great bounding meadow revival for which science was primarily responsible though geoffrey jordan's hand in the matter was never publicly disclosed as the father and mother after the excitement subsided concluded to keep the secret they alone unless lizzie scott had a guilty knowledge knew that the boy having acquired a smattering of crude chemical lore had coated one of Farmer Scott's eggs with a thin covering of tallow, and then, with a needle, scratched the momentous words upon the shell.

A few hours' immersion, and a strong solution of lye, completed the miracle.

Levy is one of the darkest parts of Florida.

It's a good place to look at the Leonid meteor showers and that sort of thing.

I've been out to Levy quite a lot.

I've been all over Florida.

Uh, lately I have been trying to get back to basics, and one of the cool things that I was able to do, uh, just last week, um, was actually meet up with a friend and go watch a meteor shower.

Now this is something that I have done since I was a kid, so longtime listeners of the show will know that one of the early inspirations, uh, to me on my journey of astronomy, uh, was seeing the 2001 Leonids meteor storm.

Uh, that was something unlike anything I have ever seen and probably will ever see again.

Uh, though I do certainly hope to see a meteor storm again someday, uh, there's no guarantee that it will happen obviously.

The Leonids, uh, are one of the higher rated showers in terms of, uh, likelihood to have a so-called storm appear, and I believe it's every 20 or 30 years that one of these tends to happen, um, if it happens at all.

Uh, there's never a guarantee that it will.

Uh, but that was incredible.

So, uh, I actually went online a couple years ago and I found, uh, some videos from the, uh, the meteor storm from 2001, and that was really cool to see that some people actually were able to capture it.