The Farmington times. (Farmington, St. Francois County, Mo.) 1905-1926, 1918-03-15
A WONDERFUL DISPLAY


On Thursday night of last week,
March Z, 1918, the people of Farming
ton and vicinity were treated to the
rare sight of that wonderful phenom-
enon known as the Aurora Borealis,
or Northern Lights, the cause Of
which has created much speculation
in ancient, medieval and modern
times; and seems to be as little UNDER
stood now as in centuries gone by.
We first noticed it at 7:15, just about
the time it go dark enough to be dis
cerned, and we came into the house
at once and telephoned the neighbors
to step out and see the wonderful
lights. Then we took our stand out
in the yard and looked, and admired,
and wondered as we saw the different
shades Of light appear in almost all
the colors of the rainbow; first in
light (almost white) spot which, at
times, would enlarge exceedingly rap
idly and then start on its journey some
times almost straight up, then toward
the west, and at other times toward
the east, and gradually become paler
as it went, and finally disappeared al
together, only to be matched, or fol-
lowed, at once by another in some
other part of the northern sky; and in
the same way red spots would sud-
denly make their appearance in diff
ferent parts of the sky and move
sometimes east, then west and some
times rise straight up till they would
reach the zenith, and both the white
spots and the red ones would often
be so dense that they would entirely
hide the small stars and make those
of the first magnitude look very dim.
Then white spot would start up all
at once in the northwest and rise
quite rapidly and in shape like cir
rus cloud and pass almost overhead
in it's journey toward the east, and
when it would reach the eastern hor-
lion its entire length would have the
appearance of huge white rainbow,
entirely across the northern sky, yet
altogether above the north star; and
its wonderful width would reach out
and stand directly overhead; and at
other times these rainbow appearances
would be much lower, and would pass
| directly between us and the north
star; and at other times white or red
flashes would shoot up from COM
mon source and would dart up quite
like a rocket, yet leaving its red or
| white streak of light behind in a per-
manent condition for some minutes,
or till the entire spot, sometimes COW
ering a tenth part of the northern
hemisphere, would disappear. Also
white or red spot would sometimes ap-
near all of a sudden and remain
bright for only a few moments and
then disappear without moving in any
direction. Some spots, and also the
end of the rainbow circles, extended so
for south, in the east, as to reach the
exact eastern point of the compass,
but toward the west they only reach
ed a. little south Of west, northwest,
and at II p. m. they were all gone
and the sky looked natural.
These strange lights have caused
much fear and excitement among the
ignorant and especially the colored
people of the south, as they think
these and the comets are forerunners
of some great trouble, as bad cpell
of weather, a great war, etc. Yet
neither one has anything whatever
to .do-with the weather, war or other
| things. T. B. CHANDLER.
P. 81 wish to say however, that
although l have seen these lights
many times, this is the first time /
ever saw white spots and red ones at
the same time, and also the first time
l ever saw them in the shape of rain
bows, reaching entirely across the sky.
IT r C.