Time Surfing: Experience History Firsthand.
Historical Backdrop
On May 19, 1780, an eerie darkness fell across New England in the middle of the day. By late morning the sky turned a sickly yellow, then coppery brown, and by noon it was so dark that people lit candles to eat dinner, birds went to roost, and roosters crowed as if it were dusk. In 1780, with the Revolutionary War still raging, many people fell to their knees believing Judgment Day had arrived. Our subject is Ezekiel Hale, a thirty-eight-year-old farmer in the Connecticut River Valley near Wethersfield, Connecticut. He is a hard-working, plain-spoken man who farms rye, corn, and flax with his wife Mercy and their children.
May 19, 1780 — 4:40 a.m. — Hale farmstead, Wethersfield, Connecticut
You roll off the rope-strung bed before the rooster finishes crowing. Your bare feet hit cold plank floors. You pull on your shirt and breeches in the gray half-light, splash icy water from a wooden basin onto your face, and step outside. The eastern sky glows a strange deep red, far redder than any sunrise you remember. You squint at it, uneasy, then grab the milk pail and head for the barn.
May 19, 1780 — 6:15 a.m. — The barn
May 19, 1780 — 9:30 a.m. — The rye field
You’re hoeing weeds between rows of young rye when you stop and lean on the handle. Something is wrong with the light. The sun is a dull copper disk you can stare at without hurting your eyes, swimming behind a brownish haze. The air tastes faintly of smoke. Birds that should be singing have gone quiet. Down the lane you see your neighbor standing still in his field, head tipped back, staring up at the sky just like you.
May 19, 1780 — 10:45 a.m. — The farmhouse kitchen
You come in from the field because it’s grown too dark to work. Inside, Mercy has lit two tallow candles on the trestle table though it’s nearly noon. The children huddle close. The smell of burning tallow mixes with smoke seeping in through the cracks. Mercy looks up at you with frightened eyes and asks if it’s the end of the world. You have no answer. The baby fusses. Outside, a rooster crows in confusion.
May 19, 1780 — 11:30 a.m. — The dooryard
