Weston, 1807: America's first recorded fall
Two Yale professors and a famous quote that probably never happened.
Early on the morning of 14 December 1807, a fireball exploded over Weston, Connecticut, and several stones fell, the largest smashing on a rock. Benjamin Silliman and James Kingsley of Yale College gathered the pieces and published the first scientific account of a meteorite fall in the United States.
President Thomas Jefferson is often quoted as saying it was easier to believe that two Yankee professors would lie than that stones would fall from heaven. Historians have found no evidence he said it, though he was certainly cautious about the claims.
The Weston meteorite is an H4 ordinary chondrite, and pieces are held at Yale's Peabody Museum.
In the catalogue
- Weston H4, United States, 1807 · 150 kg