This Day in History, 1985: Earthquake Rocks New York
On October 19, 1985, exactly twenty-one years ago today, a small earthquake shook the New York City area.
I remember it well. It was the morning of the PSATs, and when the earthquake happened I was in the shower. I had never experienced an earthquake before, so I had no reference yet with which to compare my experience. I had always thought of an earthquake as a shaking of the ground, but that's not what this one was like. It felt as if the world tilted for a moment with a rumble, and then readjusted itself.
Needless to say, the earthquake was the talk of all the eleventh grade when we arrived at the school later that morning to take the PSATs.
By the way, today is also the nineteenth anniversary of Black Monday, the day in 1987 when the Dow-Jones fell 508 points.
I remember it well. It was the morning of the PSATs, and when the earthquake happened I was in the shower. I had never experienced an earthquake before, so I had no reference yet with which to compare my experience. I had always thought of an earthquake as a shaking of the ground, but that's not what this one was like. It felt as if the world tilted for a moment with a rumble, and then readjusted itself.
Needless to say, the earthquake was the talk of all the eleventh grade when we arrived at the school later that morning to take the PSATs.
By the way, today is also the nineteenth anniversary of Black Monday, the day in 1987 when the Dow-Jones fell 508 points.
Seriously. :)
What I remember about Black Monday is the next morning, as I sat in a freshman Physics lecture while students passed a newspaper around with a cover story about the Dow. Our minds definitely were not focused on work that day.
You'll notice that
i keep forgetting i'm a year "older" than you. i was a senior, so no PSATs for me. LIRR service was cancelled the whole weekend for track inspection, otherwise i'd have been at the Columbia thing of ours. we didn't meet till the following spring, tho, so i wouldn't have noticed your absence. ;)
Did we meet in the Lloyd Motz class?
i was only in it the one year. my fall class was quantum particles: quarks flavors etc. i forget the professor's name, but i do remember him rushing in all excited about whatever related thing they'd just done out at BNL during the week since our previous class. he was not dry.
Wow, the equations for the star. Somewhere I may still have all my notes for that. I do know I have an autographed copy of one of Motz's books, and a copy of his textbook somewhere in my Mom's basement.
But physics was my main interest, so those were the ones I took.