Authors: Charles Fort
It so happens that I have record of what one English astronomer was doing, in this period. Upon the night of November 25, he was looking up at the sky.
Meteoric observations are conventionalities.
New stars are unconventionalities.
See
Nature,
Dec. 21, 1876—this night, this astronomer observed meteors.
There was a volcanic eruption in the Philippines upon the 26th of November. About two weeks later, a red rain fell in Italy.
There is considerable in this book that is in line with the teachings of the most primitive theology. We have noted how agreeable I am sometimes to the most southern Methodists. It is that scientific orthodoxy of today has brutally, or mechanically, or unintelligently, reacted sheerly against all beliefs of the preceding, or theological, orthodoxy, and has reacted too far. All reactions react too far. Then a reaction against this reaction must of course favor, or restore, some of the beliefs of the earlier orthodoxy.
Often before disasters upon this earth there have been appearances that were interpretable as warnings.
But if a godness places kindly lights in the sky, also is it spreading upon the minds of this earth a darkness of scientists. This is about the beneficence of issuing warnings, and also seeing to it that the warnings shall not be heeded. This may not be idiocy. It may be “divine plan” that surplus populations shall be murdered. In less pious terms we may call this maintenance of equilibrium.
If surplusages of people upon this earth should reduce, and if then it should, in the organic sense, becomes desirable that people in disaster zones should live longer, or die more lingeringly, provided for them are phenomena of a study of warnings, a study that is now, or that has been, subject to inhibitions.
Aug. 31, 1886—“Just before the sun dropped behind the horizon, it was eclipsed by a mass of inky, black clouds.” People noted this appearance. It was like the “dense, mountain-like cloud” that appeared, at Callao, Peru, before the earthquake of Sept. 4, 1868. But these people were in a North American city. Meteors were seen. They were like the fire balls that have shot from this earth’s volcanoes. Luminous clouds, such as have been seen at times of this earth’s eruptions, appeared, and people watched them. There was no thought of danger. There was a glare. More meteors. The city of Charleston, S.C., was smashed.
People running from their houses—telegraph poles falling around them—they were meshed in coils of wires. Street lamps and lights in houses waved above, like lights of a fishing fleet that had cast out nets. It was a catch of bodies, but that was because minds had been meshed in the net of a cult, woven out of the impudence of the De Ballores and the silences of the Davisons, spread to this day upon every school of this earth.
The ground went on quaking. Down from the unknown came, perhaps, a volcanic discharge upon this quaking ground. Whether it were volcanic dust, or not, it is said, in the
New York World,
September 4, that “volcanic dust” was failing, at Wilmington, N.C.
September 5th—a severe shock, at Charleston, and a few minutes later came a brilliant meteor, which left a long train of fire. At the same time, two brilliant meteors were seen, at Columbia, S.C. See almost any newspaper, of the time. I happen to take from the London
Times,
September 7.
There was another discharge from the unknown—or a “strange cloud” appeared, upon the 8th of September, off the coast of South Carolina. The cloud hung, heavy, in the sky, and was thought to be from burning grass on one of the islands.
Charleston News and Courier,
September 10—that such was the explanation, but that no grass was known to be burning.
If a procession starts at Washington Square, New York City, and, if soldiers arrive in Harlem, and then keep on arriving in Harlem, I explain that, in spite of all the eccentricities of Harlem, Harlem is neither flying away from the procession, nor turning on 125th Street, for an axis. Meteors kept on coming to Charleston. They kept on arriving at this quaking part of this earth’s surface, as if at a point on a stationary body. The most extraordinary display was upon the night of October 22nd. There was a severe quake, at Charleston, while these meteors were falling. About fifty appeared
(New York Sun,
November 1). About midnight, October 23-24, a meteor exploded over Atlanta, Ga., casting a light so intense that small objects on the ground were visible
(New York Herald,
October 25). A large meteor, at Charleston, night of October 24th
(Monthly Weather Review,
1886-296). An extraordinary meteor, at Charleston, night of the 28th, is described, in the
News and Courier,
of the 29th, as “a strange, celestial visitor.”
“It was only coincidence.”
There is no conventional seismologist, and there is no orthodox astronomer, who says otherwise.
In the
Friend of India,
June 22, 1897, is another record of some of the meteors that were seen in Charleston: that, at the time of the great quake, Prof. Oswald saw meteor after meteor shoot from an apparent radiant near Leo. Carl McKinley, in his
Descriptive Narrative of the Earthquake of August 31, 1886,
records a report from Cape Romain Light Station, upon “an unusual fall of meteors during the night.”
Again a volcanic discharge came to this point—or a fall of ashes was reported. In the
News and Courier,
November 20, it is said that, about ten days before, ashes had fallen from the sky, at Summerville, S.C. It is said that the material was undoubtedly ashes. Then it is said that it had been discovered that, upon the day of this occurrence, there had been “an extensive forest fire near Summerville.”
Monthly Weather Review,
October and November, 1886—under “Forest and Prairie Fires,” there is no mention of a forest fire, either small or extensive, in either North or South Carolina.
Summerville, and not Charleston, was the center of the disturbances. Ashes came from somewhere exactly to this central point.
In
A Study of Recent Earthquakes,
Dr. Charles Davison gives thirty-six pages to an account of phenomena at Charleston. He studies neither meteors nor anything else that was seen in the sky. He studiously avoids all other occurrences upon this earth, at this time. Refine such a study to a finality of omissions, and the vacancy of the imbecile is the ideal of the student. I approve this, as harmless.
The other occurrences were enormous. Destruction in South Carolina was small compared with a catastrophe in Greece. Upon the day of the first slight shock, at Charleston (August 27th), there was a violent quake in Greece, and at the same time, torrents poured from the sky, in Turkey, carrying away houses and cattle and bridges
(Levant Herald,
September 8). Thousands of houses collapsed, and hundreds of persons perished. This day, there was a shock, at Srinagar, Kashmir: shocks in Italy and Malta; and increased activity of Vesuvius. Just such an inky cloud as was seen at Charleston, was seen in the eastern Mediterranean, at the time of the catastrophe in Greece—reported by the captain of the steamship
La Valette
—see
Malta Standard,
September 2—“a mass of thick, black smoke, changing into a reddish color.” “The sea was perfectly calm, at the time.” In the sky of Greece, there was a glare, like the light of a volcanic eruption
(Comptes Rendus,
103-565).
I confess to a childish liking for making little designs, or arrangements of data, myself. And every formal design depends upon blanks, as much as upon occupied spaces. But my objection to such a patternmaker as Dr. Davison is to the preponderance of what he leaves out. In Dr. Davison’s thirty-six pages upon the lesser catastrophe, at Charleston, he spins thin lines of argument, in a pretty pattern of agreements, around omissions. It is his convention that all earthquakes are of local, subterranean origin—so he leaves out all appearances in the sky, and mentions none of the other violences that disturbed a zone around this earth. It is a monstrous disproportion, when a mind that should be designing embroidery takes catastrophes for the lines and blanks of its compositions.
It is my expression that if a clipper of data should mislay his scissors, or should accidentally let in an account of one of the many localized repetitions of meteors, he would tell of an indication that this earth is, or is almost, stationary. Night of October 20th—meteors falling at Srinagar, Kashmir. There was an earthquake. Shocks and falls of meteors continued together. According to my searches in Indian newspapers, these repeating meteors were seen nowhere else. As to zone-phenomena, I point out that there is a difference of only one degree of latitude between Charleston and Srinagar. For the data, see the
Times of India,
November 5.
If a string of meteors should be flying toward this earth, and if the first of them should fall to this earth, at Srinagar, how is anybody going to think of the rest of them falling exactly here, if this earth is speeding away from them? Sometimes I am almost inclined to have a little faith, of course not in general reasoning, but anyway in my own reasoning, and I go on to observe that a long string of meteors can be thought of, as coming down to the one point where the first fell, if that point is not moving away from them. But I begin to suspect that the trouble with me is that I am simple-minded, and that mine enemies, whom I call “conventionalists,” are more subtle than I am, and prefer their views, because mine are so obvious. Of course this earth is stationary, in a surrounding of revolving stars so far from far away that an expedition could sail to them. But no dialectician, of any fastidiousness, would be attracted by a subject so easy to maintain.
Back to data—geysers spouted from the ground, at Charleston, and there were sulphurous emissions. The ground was incipiently volcanic and charged electrically.
Meteors and smoky discharges and glares and falls of ashes and enormous pours of water, as if from a volcano that was moving around a zone of this earth—
And there is no knowing when, in the year 1886, disturbances began in the constellation Andromeda.
In the
Observatory,
9-402, it is said that, upon September 26th, a new star in the Andromeda nebula had been reported by one astronomer, but that, according to another astronomer, there was no such new star.
Astronomical Register,
1886-269—that, upon October 3rd, a new star in this nebula had been photographed.
I think of our existence as a battery—an enormous battery, or, in the cosmic sense, a little battery. So I think of volcanic regions, or incipiently volcanic regions, in a land of the stars and in a land of this earth, as electrodes, which are mutually perturbative, and between which flow quantities of water and other volcanic discharges, in electrolytic, or electrically teleportative, currents. According to data, I think that some teleportations are instantaneous, and that some are slow drifts. To illustrate what I mean by stimulation, most likely electric, by interacting volcanoes, and transportation, or electric teleportation, of matter, between mutually affective volcanoes, I shall report a conversation, which, unlike mere human dialogue, was seen, as well as heard.
Upon the evening of Sept. 3, 1902, at Martinique, where the volcano Mont Pelée humps high, Prof. Angelo Heilprin, as he tells in his book,
Mont Pelée,
saw southward, at sea, electric flashes. They were in the direction of La Soufrière, the volcano upon the island of St. Vincent, ninety miles away. La Soufrière was flashing. Then Pelée answered. Pelée hugely answered, in tones befitting greater magnitude. A dozen flickers in the southern sky—and then Pelée speaking up, with a blinding, electric opinion. The little female volcano, or anyway the volcano with a feminine name, nagged and nagged, and was then answered with a roar. This bickering kept up a long time.
About five o’clock, morning of the 4th, there was another appearance, upon the southern horizon. It was a dense bulk of smoke from La Soufrière. It drifted slowly. It went directly to Pelée, and massed about Pelée.
There’s no use arguing with a little, female volcano: she casts out obscurations. But there may be enormous use for this occurrence regarded as data.
27
Once upon a time, one of this earth’s earlier scientists pronounced, or enunciated, or he told a story, which was somewhat reasonable, of a flood, and of all the animals of this earth saved, as species, in a big boat. Perhaps the story was not meant seriously by its author, but was a satire upon the ambitious boat-builders of his day. It is probable that all religions are founded upon ancient jokes and hoaxes. But, considering the relative fewness of the animals that were known to the scientists, or the satirists, of that early time, this story was as plausible as the science, or as the best satire, of any time. However data of such a host of animals piled up that the story of the big boat lost its plausibility.
Note that our data are upon events of which the founders of the present so-called science of astronomy knew little, or knew nothing. Orthodox astronomy has been systematized, without considering new stars, their phenomena and indications. It is a big boat story. Once upon a time it was plausible. It is in the position of the orthodox geology of former times, when a doctrine was formulated without consideration for fossils and sedimentary rocks. But, when fossils and sedimentary rocks were incorporated, they forced a radical readjustment. New stars were not taken into the so-called science of astronomy, by the builders of that system, because no astronomer ever saw, or reported, a new star, between the years 1670 and 1848. Presumably new stars have not started appearing all at once in modern times. Presumably, in this period of 178 years, many new stars appeared, and were not seen, though we shall have data for thinking that some of them shone night after night with the brilliance of first magnitude. One would like to know what, when time after time, the sky was probably spectacular with a new light, the astronomers were doing, in these 178 years. We may be able to answer that question, if we can find out what the astronomers are doing now.
There is not agreement among the wisemen. Virtually there is, by the wisemen of our tribes, no explanation of new stars. The collision theory is heard of most.
Always—provided there have been little boys and other amateurs to inform them—the wise ones tell of stars that have collided. They have never told of stars that are going to collide.
Why is a story always of stars that have collided? Assuming now that, instead of being points in a revolving shell, stars are swiftly moving bodies, there must be instances of stars that are going to collide, some days, weeks, or years from any given time.
It is too much to assume that only dark stars collide, or the preponderance of dark stars would be so great that the sky would be black with Inky Ways. So far, we have not a fair impression of how frequently new stars appear. It will be said that stars that are so close to each other that, in a year or so, they will collide, have, because of their enormous distance from this earth, the appearance of one point of light.
This takes us to one of the solemnest and laughablest of the wisemen’s extravagances. It is their statement that, after two stars have collided, they can, by means of the spectroscope, pick out in what is to the telescope only one point of light, the fragments of an alleged collision, the velocities and the directions of these parts.
If any spectroscopist can do this thing that the reading public is told that he can do, never mind about parts where he says there has been a collision, but let him pick out a point in the sky, which is of parts that are going to collide. Let him tell where a new star is going to be: otherwise let him go on being told, by amateurs, where a new star is.
New stars appear. There are disturbances upon this earth—there are volcanic appearances in the sky—volumes of smoke and dust roll down upon this earth.
And the meaning of it all may someday be—“Skyward ho!” Storms, upon a constellation’s vacant areas, of Poles and Russians. A black cloud appears in the sky of Lyra, and down pours a deluge of Italians. Drifting sands of Scandinavians sift down to a star.
Jan. 5, 1892—just such a fiery blast as has often torn down the slopes of Vesuvius, shot across the State of Georgia. It was “a black tornado, filled with fire”
(Chicago Tribune,
January 7). About this time, there were shocks in Italy, and, in the evening, people in many parts of New York State were looking up and wondering at a glare in the sky. The next day they had something else to wonder about. There were shocks in New York State. Upon the 8th, dust that was perhaps volcanic, but that had probably been discharged from no volcano of this earth, fell from the sky, in Northern Indiana. 14th—“tidal wave” in the Atlantic, and a shock, at Memphis, Tennessee. Snow fell in Mobile, Alabama, where there had been only four falls of snow in seventy years. Floods in New England. Quakes in Japan, 15th, 16th, 17th. At this time began an eruption of Tongariro, New Zealand. “Tidal wave,” or seismic wave, in Lake Michigan, upon the 18th. For references, see the New York newspapers. The
Philadelphia Public Ledger,
January 27, reported a fall, from the sky, of a mass of fire into a town in Massachusetts, upon the 20th. At this time, Rome, Italy, was quaking. Shocks in France, two days later. Shocks in Italy and Sicily. January 24th—a great meteor, with thunderous detonations, shot over Cape Colony, South Africa
(Cape Argus,
February 2 and 4). A drought, at Durango, Mexico, was broken by rain, the first to fall in four years. Upon the night of the 26th, there was a glare in the sky that alarmed people throughout Germany. Severest shock ever known in Tasmania, upon the 27th, and shocks in many places in Victoria, Australia. In the night sky of England, people watched a luminous cloud
(Nature,
45-365; 46-127).
There was a new star.
In all the Observatories of this earth, not a professional astronomer had observed anything out of the ordinary: but, in Edinburgh, a man who knew nothing of astronomical technicalities
(Nature,
45-365) looked up at the sky, and saw the new star, night of February 1st. Throughout this period of the glares and the shocks and the seeming volcanic discharges, a new star, or a new celestial volcano, had been shining in the constellation Auriga. The amateur, Dr. Anderson, told the professionals. They examined photographs, and learned that they had been photographing the new star since December 1st.
The look of data is that volcanic dust drifted from a new star to the sky of this earth, in Indiana, in not more than thirty-nine days.
For four hours, upon the 8th of January, dust came down from the sky in Northern Indiana, and if it did come from regions external to this earth, it came settling down, hour after hour, as if to a point upon a stationary earth. I have searched in many scientific periodicals, and in newspapers of all continents, finding record of no volcanic eruption upon this earth, by which to explain.
La Nature,
41-206—that this dust had been analyzed, and had been identified as of volcanic origin.
Science,
21-303—that this dust had been analyzed, and had been identified as not of volcanic origin.
Monthly Weather Review,
January, 1892—“It was in all probability of volcanic origin.”
I have records of five other new stars, which, from Dec. 21, 1896, to Aug. 10, 1899, appeared at times of disturbances upon this earth; times of deluges and of volcanic discharges that cannot be attributed to terrestrial volcanoes. Two of the discoveries were made by amateurs. The other discoveries were made by professionals, who, with nothing at all resembling celerity, learned, by examining photographic plates, that new stars that had been looked at by astronomers had been recorded by cameras. The period of one of these incelerities was eleven years. See
Nature,
85-248.
Star after star has appeared, as a minute point, or as a magnificent sight in the heavens, and the professional astronomers have been unobservatory. They have been notified by amateurs. We shall have records of youngsters who have seen what they were not observing. The first of the bright infants, of whom I have record, is Seth Chandler, of Boston. I have it that anybody who is only nineteen years old, or, for that matter, twenty-nine, is a youngster. Seth was nineteen years old. Upon May 12, 1866, an amateur astronomer, named Birmingham, at Tuam, Ireland, notified the professional astronomers, who were looking somewhere else, that there was a new star in the constellation Corona Borealis. In the United States, the professional astronomers were busily engaged looking in other directions. Upon the night of the 14th, Seth Chandler interrupted their observations, telling them that there was something to look at. For any pessimist, who is interested in what becomes of exceptionally bright boys, and the disappointing records of many of them, I note that when this bright youngster grew up, he became a professional astronomer.
What on earth—pretty nearly assuredly unrelated to the skies—were the professionals doing, February, 1901? Night of February 22nd—and Dr. Anderson, the amateur who had discovered
Nova Aurigae,
nine years before, looked up at the constellation Perseus, and, even though he had probably been befoozling himself with astronomical technicalities ever since, saw something new, and knew the new, when he saw it. It was a magnificent new star. It was a splendor that scintillated over stupidity—not a professional, at any of this earth’s Observatories, knew of this spectacle, until informed by Dr. Anderson. Usually it is said that Dr. Anderson discovered this star, but his claim has been contested. In Russia, it was recorded that, nine hours earlier, at a time when the sleepiest of the Observatories had not yet closed down, or had not yet quit not observing, the new star had been discovered by Andreas Borisiak of Kieff. Andreas was a schoolboy.
Before the discovery of this new star in Perseus, or
Nova Persei,
there had been appearances like volcanic phenomena, unattributable, however, to any volcano of this earth. Upon the morning of February 13th, deep greenish-yellow clouds, spreading intensest darkness, appeared in France
(Bull. Soc. Astro. de France,
March, 1901). Upon the 16th, a black substance fell from the sky, in Michigan
(Monthly Weather Review,
29-465). There was the extreme coldness that often results from interferences with sunlight, by volcanic dust. At Naples, three persons were found to have frozen to death, night of the 13th (London
Daily Mail,
February 15). A red substance fell with snow near Mildenhall (London
Daily Mail,
February 22). It may have been functionally transmitted organic matter. “Pigeons seemed to feed upon it.”
I have data for thinking that at least four nights before Dr. Anderson’s observation, this new star, or a beam from it, though unseen at all Observatories, was magnificently visible. I think so, because, upon the night of the 18th, somebody in Finchley (London) and somebody in Tooting (London) saw something that they thought was a comet. Upon the night of the 20th, somebody in Tottenham saw it. A story of three somebodies who had seen something that was missed by all this earth’s professional astronomers, would not be worth much, if told after an announcement of a discovery, but these observations were told of in the London
Daily Mail,
published upon the morning of February 22nd, before Dr. Anderson was heard from.
Sixteen days after the Anderson observation, dust arrived upon this earth—or it fell from the sky—in volumes that were proportional to this outburst of first magnitude in the heavens. The new star at its brightest was of the magnitude of Vega. Dust, of the redness of many volcanic dusts, and of no African deserts that one hears anything of—and if African deserts ever are red, moving picture directors, who are strong for realism, or, rather, sometimes are, should hear about this—fell from the sky. It came down, upon the 9th and 10th of March, in Sicily, Tunis, Italy, Germany, and Russia. A thick orange-red stain was reported from Ongar, Essex, England, upon the 12th (London
Daily Mail,
March 19).
The standardized explanation was published. I shall oppose it with heresy. Throughout this book, I say that all expressions of mine are only mental phenomena, and sometimes may be rather awful specimens, even at that. But, if we examine our opposition, and find it wanting, and if my own expression includes much that it left out, my own expression is not wanting, whether it’s wanted, or not. Two wisemen wrote the standardized explanation. The red dust had come from an African desert. See
Nature,
66-41.
They wrote that they had traced this dust to a hurricane in an African desert, pointing out that, upon the first day, it had fallen in Tunis. That looked like a first fall near an African desert.
But the meteorologists are not banded like the astronomers. For a record of a fall, not so near an alleged African desert, see
Symons’ Met. Mag.,
1902-25—that while this dust was falling in Tunis, also it was falling in Russia. That this dust did come to this earth from outer space—see the
Chemical News,
83-159—Dr. Phipson’s opinion that it was meteoric. That may be accepted as the same as volcanic.
My own expression—
That a hurricane that could have strewn Europe with dust, from the Mediterranean to Denmark, and from England to Russia, could have been no breeze fluttering obscurely in some African desert, but a devastating force that would have fanned all Northern Africa into taking notice—
Lagos
(Gold Coast)
Record,
March-April, 1901—no mention of a whirlwind of any kind in Africa. In the
Egyptian Gazette
(Alexandria) there is nothing relating to atmospheric disturbances. There is nothing upon any such subject noted in the
Sierra Leone News. Al-Moghreb
(Tangier) reports the falls of dust in Europe, but mentions no raising of dust anywhere in Africa.
But there was a new star.
The standardized explanation is perforated with omissions. It seems unthinkable that mind upon this earth could be so bound down to this earth by this thing of gaps, until we reflect that so are all nets fabricated. In Austria, while this dust was falling, the earth quaked. What could such an occurrence have to do with dust from an African desert? Omitted. But at the time of this quake, something else was seen, and it may have been a volcanic bomb that had been shot from a star. London
Daily Mail,
March 13—a great meteor was seen. Dust falling in Tunis—and that was told. More of the omitted—see the
Levant Herald,
March 11—that while the dust was falling in Tunis, there were violent earthquakes in Algeria. Something else that was left out—see the
English Mechanic,
73-96, and the
Bull. Soc. Astro. de France,
April, 1901—that, upon March 12th, ashes fell from the sky, at Avellino, Italy.