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(meteorobs) Forward: More thoughts on Kingsmill's 1886 Shanghai Meteor Storm
I received an E-mail from John Greaves today which I felt contained a
potentially valuable insight when
all the pros and cons are finally weighed in the Kingsmill 1886 Shanghai
Meteor Storm. Since he is not a meteorobs
subscriber, I herewith, with his permission, forward his e-mail.
Kim Y.
<SNIP!>
Kingsmill sent his letter into Nature in 1900. Without checking in the
books, and just using memory, I believe 1899/1900 was the first
_predicted_ return of the Leonid storm, and that in the event it was
something of a damp squib!
NATURE will have been full of stuff on the Leonids in 1899 and 1900, and
this may well have been what prompted Kingsmill to write in.
Therefore: Kingsmill's knowledge of matters meteoric at the time of his
writing may only have been one year old, similarly his 'identification'
of what he saw with a Leonid storm may have been equally as new a
realisation. That is: his apparent astronomic knowledge and certitude
re Leonids may just be a consequence of what he had recently read in
Nature, and not what he thought at the time. So he _could_ be entirely
unaware of the Bielids.
The alpha Monocerotids also have a November date [though that'd be a
pre-discovery and 1885 again due to a 10 year periodicity], and the
obscure mu Pegasids also have a November date with _possible_ showers in
1883 and 1893 according to Jenniskens in Meteors II
John Greaves
<snip>
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