The Petal paper. [volume] (Petal, Miss.) 1953-19??, 1956-11-29

occupied the orbit now used by
the fragments.
1t is well established fact that
the Leonids occupy the path of a
comet. The fragments are now or
have been clustered. The earth
passes through the path of me-
teors each November. In times
past it has passed through the
main cluster of them. When we
do pass through this cluster, we
have phenomenal display OF
fireworks as happened on Nov. II
1888 when "the stars fell'.
On that memorable date, the
inhabitants of the United States
who saw the phenomena were
frightened out of their wits by the
falling of the stars. From about
midnight on to day break as many
as 20 meteors per second fell at
times. Sometimes, the sky was as
bright as day. All of this hap
pened without warning, so the
people were unprepared for the
surprise.
There was another display of
about equal brilliance in 1866. It
did not cause so much consterna
ton because the people expected
it. There had been a build up of
fireworks on preceding years. Be-
tween 1866 and 1899 the cluster
of meteors had to pass near the
two giant planets Jupiter and Sat-
urn. At this time they were pulled
out of line and have since pro-
duced no spectacular display. Elk
cept for this, we could expect a
good show about 1865 At any
time when we. cross their path,
an interesting cluster may be en-
countered. ..@ o. Il liza.
The Total Lunar Eclipse
AS the moon makes its monthly
circuit around the earth it has to
pass between us and the. sun at
| new and around behind us at full.
1t is only. at new moon, when it is
between us and the son, that we
can have a solar eclipse. 1t is only
when the moon is full that we can
have lunar eclipse. Since the
plane of the moons orbit is not
parallel to the earth's orbit and
they do not coincide, the two
bodies do not come exactly be-
tween each other and the sun at
each new and full moon. If they
did, we would have 13 eclipses of
each per year.
The lunar eclipse is caused by
the moon passing into the earth's
shadow. The earth, being 5000
miles IN diameter, casts a much
larger and longer shadow that the
moon, which is 2,160 miles in di-
ameter. The moon will pass with
one edge near the center of our
shadow. This will give the moon
chance to enter the total shadow
completely, and, therefore, pro.
duce total clipse. nr
For observers who want to see
the whole process, the time of the
beginning of the moon to enter
the shadow is 1903 pm. on Nov.
IL. 1t will be completely in the
total shadow at 1908 am. on Nov.
l8. 1t will begin to leave the total
shadow at LIZ am. and will be
completely out of it at 2:33 am.
The moon will be visible with
a dull bronze color even in the
dimmest shadow. The reason for
this is that the atmosphere Of the
earth bends the long rays of light
OF the sun enough for them to
strike the moon and wive it light
to make it visible. The red color
will be very great contrast to
the normal appearance of the
moon.
The reason the time is so long
for the eclipse is because the moon
is very near the earth. The dis
lance varies from 251 900 miles on
Nov. 8 to $4,000 miles on Nov. q.
This means the moon passes
through the shadow where it is
relatively large.
The U. S. government gets