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Not Since Tecumseh: Darkness at Midday over the Ohio Country

Total Eclipse of the Sun – April 8, 2024

Hear about the dynamics causing solar eclipses and some of the history associated with this famous eclipse. Tom O’Grady is an instructor of Observational Astronomy at Ohio University.

The last time Ohio was witness to a total eclipse of the sun was on June 16, 1806. The 1806 eclipse has gone down in history as Tecumseh’s Eclipse. Tecumseh was working to create a confederation of Native tribes to resist continued losses of land to the increased expansion of settlers in this formerly native territory. Future president and then military leader in the newly formed State of Ohio, William Henry Harrison, tried to stop him. In his efforts to discredit Tecumseh and his brother The Prophet, Harrison publicly challenged the Shawnee leadership by calling upon them to prove this power daring them to “cause the Sun to stand still or the Moon to alter its course, the rivers to cease to flow or the dead to rise from their graves.” Tecumseh used his knowledge of the approaching eclipse to reinforce the role of The Prophet and himself in the political dynamics unfolding in the newly formed region called the State of Ohio.

As well as discussing some of the history associated with this famous eclipse, we will learn about subsequent eclipse expeditions, and a few stories about war and peace associated with this unique celestial phenomenon. O’Grady, Astronomy Instructor at Ohio University since 1984,  has chased the Moon’s shadow eight times to witness the appearance of distant stars and planets in the daytime, to see the outer atmosphere of the sun, and to observe the altered behavior of wild animals and livestock. This unique natural marvel, which struck a fear and awe in early people causing some of them to build enormous earthworks with which to predict such events in the future, will not occur again in Ohio skies until September 14, 2099.

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