New Madrid

This was his expressed wish.

My father accompanied Major Barry to New Madrid, where the fatal duel was fought, and stayed by him until the end came, received his last sigh, his last words, and closed his dying eyes, and afterwards conveyed the remains of his best friend to the bereaved family with a sad heart.

Though sympathizing deeply with them in their affliction, my father was much disturbed as to what disposition would be made of him.

And after Major Barry was consigned with loving hands to his last resting place, these haunting thoughts obtruded even in his sleeping hours.

Emmett Till actually is my cousin.

My grandmother and Emmett Till Sr. would, uh, you know, spend the summers in a watering hole in New Madrid.

My grandmother marched with Dr.

King at Selma.

Rules and restrictions may apply.

[upbeat music] The New Madrid Seismic Zone, otherwise known as the NMSZ, is located in the Midwest and Southern United States, covering territory in northeastern Arkansas, southeastern Missouri, western Kentucky and Tennessee, and southern Illinois.

The zone is the most active seismic area east of the Rocky Mountains and could affect major cities such as St. Louis, Little Rock, and Memphis.

What makes the New Madrid Seismic Zone unique is that it is an intraplate earthquake zone.

This means earthquakes occur within the interior of a tectonic plate.

These are relatively rare since most earthquakes occur at tectonic plate boundaries, such as the Ring of Fire around the Pacific Ocean.

Intraplate rifts tend to occur in weak parts of the Earth's crust that were once active tectonic zones.

Because of their prior state, these areas are weaker than the surrounding rock, leading to eventual slippage.

there was an earthquake in Memphis, and everybody knows about the San Andreas Fault in California.

New Madrid.

The worst fault in the continent of the United States runs right under Memphis.

It's the New Madrid Fault.

Exactly.

You said it, so you know it.

I know it,

yeah.

finished strong, and they got a big victory, 52-20 over Windsor.

New Madrid, who has struggled this year coming in, but had a good win against East Prairie.

New Madrid, you look at...

You know, what they've been able to do, again, a little bit of a slow start, 1-3 with head coach Tyler Fullert.

But Marcus Granberry, the sophomore quarterback, he's kind of evolving and getting better as we go.

By the seventeenth century, descriptions of the effects of earthquakes were being published around the world, although these accounts were often exaggerated or distorted.

The most widely felt earthquakes in the recorded history of North America were a series that occurred in eighteen eleven, eighteen twelve near New Madrid, Missouri.

A great earthquake, whose magnitude is estimated to be about eight, occurred on the morning of December sixteenth, eighteen eleven.

Another great earthquake occurred on January twenty-third, eighteen twelve, and a third, the strongest yet, on February seventh, eighteen twelve.

As plates continue to move and plate boundaries change over geologic time, weakened boundary regions become part of the interiors of the plates.

These zones of weakness within the continents can cause earthquakes in response to stresses that originate at the edges of the plate or in the deeper crust.

The New Madrid earthquakes of eighteen eleven and twelve and the eighteen eighty-six Charleston earthquake occurred within the North American plate.

How earthquakes happen.

Then, shortly after 2:00 in the morning, the ground started moving, and it didn't stop.

The first major New Madrid earthquake struck at approximately 2:15 AM on December 16th, 1811.

Modern estimates put it around a magnitude 7.5.

So think about that in 1811.

USGS research estimates that between December 16th and March 15th, there were more than 200 moderate to large aftershocks, including roughly 10 events that were greater than a magnitude six.

The landscape was essentially being rearranged beneath people's feet.

One of the most famous eyewitnesses was Eliza Bryan, who lived near New Madrid.

She later described the Mississippi behaving unlike anything anyone had ever seen.

Not much you can do about an earthquake.

But let's just say that Dr. Iben Browning, when he predicted that the New Madrid fault was gonna open up, there were a lot of people who were scared.

A lot of people scared.

And there were earthquakes going on at the time.