History

The History of Comets, Meteors, and Asteroids

Long ago we thought differently about comets, meteors and asteroids. Scientists thought that comets, meteors and asteroids came from the clouds like rain, sleet and snow. In fact the name meteor came from the name meteorology. There was a huge meteor shower were people all over America could see meteor after meteor light up the sky. On that night of November 12, 1833 scientists found out that the radiant point was not spinning with the earth. shower.jpg (58715 bytes) That meant whatever caused comets, meteors and asteroids came from outside the atmosphere. That’s how they found out that comets, meteors and asteroids did not come from the clouds.

This is how long ago we discovered comets and asteroids. Comets were discovered 382 years ago. Asteroids were discovered 199 years ago. That is a long time ago! comet.jpg (59184 bytes)

Throughout history cultures have had different beliefs about comets, meteors and asteroids. Written records from China and Europe extending as far back 3,000 years tell of occasional great comets moving through the sky and the terrible events people thought they caused. Overall different societies have blamed comets for wars, earthquakes, sicknesses and even the deaths of some leaders. Isn’t that odd? The great comet of 1665 was in the sky when the black plague killed 90,000 people in London and people thought it caused the deaths. When Hally’s Comet passed through the sky it proved that people hadn’t gotten over their fear of comets. Astronomers said that the Earth would pass through the tail of the comet. Many people worried and thought the world was going to die out. Certain people invented and started to sell "comet pills" which would encounter the effects of the cyanogen gas. The pills sold very well to the people who were frightened. On May 20,1910, after the Earth had passed through the tail of the comet the people who took the pills were alive, but so was everyone else! Now wouldn’t you say that’s funny? In 1997 when comet Hall-Bopp appeared, people thought there was a UFO flying behind the comet. These are all very strange events that were blamed on comets.