Science: Leonid Week

While other astronomers pondered the darkening of light (see p. 26), Dr. Willard James Fisher of Harvard Observatory anticipated an unusual brightening of darkness. He reminded U. S. stargazers that this year the Leonid meteor display will be the most brilliant since 1866. Star lovers who want to see the cosmic fireworks will have to stay up late during the first week of November, watch from midnight on without blinking. One blink may cause the watcher to miss a meteor which shines for less than 1 sec. Best astronomical advice is to keep an eye upon the constellation Leo (south of the Big Dipper) from which the darting points of light will seem to come.

The Leonid showers increase in a 33-year cycle, reaching the height of their brilliance at the end of the period. Year after next is one of their gala 33-year anniversaries. In 1899, stargazers were disappointed, complained that the Leonid performance was not worth sitting up all night for. Astronomers decided that the meteors had approached too near Jupiter, had missed the earth by being attracted out of their customary elliptical path around the sun.