From: Ralph Petrozello
Date: November 18, 1997
Subject: 


I think that it was in Nov. 1966, I don't remember the exact date, but
I remember that thanksgiving was comming up soon.  I was 15 years old.
My older brother (by three years) had rented his first apartment and we
had just come back from staying up late to finish some painting.  We got
back to my parents house, perhaps two o'clock in the morning, I'm not
sure of what time it was exactly.  My parents home is in Endwell, New
York...that's upstate, near Binghamton.  I remember it was very cold
outside that evening.  When we got out of the car, something caught our
attention.  When we looked up there appeared to be hundreds meteors
comming out of one point in the sky! The number of meteors kept
increasing until it appeared that there were literally thousands of
meteors streaming down!  (I actually thought I could hear some of them
as well!) I can only describe it as looking like you were driving in
your car, facing into a snow storm at night with your headlights on!  We
even woke up the neighbors across the street.  They thought we were
crazy at first, but thanked us later for disturbing them to see this
event that was occurring in the sky.  It was very high up in the sky. I
would say that we were facing generally in a southerly direction. I
remember the point of origin being higher than the top of telephone
pole, which was close by.  I also remember how impressed I felt by the
overall enormity of the event. I remember thinking that it had such a
vast looking depth and width, like the inside of an enormous cone! 

When I read about the possibility of seeing such an event again, I told quite
a few of my friends about my childhood experience. (I think some of them
thought I was exagerating, but I can assure you that I was not, and I am
glad that I had other witnesses.)  I don't know if this was the "Leonid"
meteor shower, but it certainly left a lasting impression on me.