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A Look at the Stars Late one night, when I was almost four
years old, I remember laying in bed, listening to my father talk downstairs
in the living room. "I wa A few minutes later, my father looked into my room. I sat
up in bed to let him know that I was awake. "Shhhhh," he said,
"don't wake your brother." Patrick was only one, and too young
for whatever we were The sky was filled with stars. Beautiful bright stars set
off against a black autumn night. It was November 9, 1965, the night of
the Great Blackout. There was no electricity anywhere in New York or most
of the New England states. We lived in Waterbury, Connecticut, and on
this night, without any lights to spoil the view, my We got to see what people through most of history saw when the sun set. A beautiful sky filled with stars. If you looked, you could see the stars arranged in patterns that told wonderful stories from the heavens. Today, we live in a great world with huge cities and instant communication. I think it's the best time in history to be alive, but it's very different from the way people lived for almost all of history. Its hard for kids today to understand how people could imagine a storybook in the sky. Recently I went on vacation. I stayed in northern Vermont, high on a mountain. Even there, the small town of St. Johnsbury, twenty miles away, gave off too much light to see sky the way I saw it more than 35 years ago. In the succeeding pages I hope to take you on an adventure across time and space. Join me as we meet interesting people from the past and present and visit all of the corners of our planet. |
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to wake him up to see this. He'll probably never have a chance to see
something like this again." My mother wanted me to stay in bed. If
I got up, I wouldn't go back to sleep. 
about
to do. "Put on your shoes and your coat, let's go outside."
dad
and I looked at the stars.