A 1910 MEMORY
FROM THE UKRANE
One of our members, Dr. Jerred Metz
of St. Louis, Missouri, is in the process of writing a book entitled HALLEY’S
COMET, 1910. He sent us a passage from
his latest published prose work, Drinking the Dipper Dry: Nine Plain-Spoken
Lives. He created the book by way
of edited tapes, having interviewed the nine people for two-and-a-half
years. The passage below was recorded
from Frank (Froika) Fershter. The
incident took place in Bondorova, Ukrane.
It was a Sunday in 1910. An automobile passed by. It was the first time the people had ever
seen an automobile. I had already seen
one because I had been to different places
The peasants were smart people, they
were intelligent people, but they weren’t educated. They didn’t know what to make of it. It was the time of Halley’s Comet. Some said it must be a part of the comet. Someone said it must be something that
brings the end of the world and someone said a devil sits in there and operates
the machine.
I don’t know how the peasants knew
about Halley’s Comet. The town where I
lived had about fifteen blocks and I don’t think amongst all of those people
there were ten people that could read or write, but everybody knew that
something was coming; they just didn’t know what it was.
I had a book that described Halley’s
Comet. Somehow the peasants knew that I
had it. So they came up to me and said,
“Froika, we want the book that tells about the comet that will come and destroy
the earth.” So I told them it’s not as
bad as that. It won’t destroy
anything. I couldn’t tell them that
nature provides the comet. If I told
them that, I’d have to explain all these things and I didn’t know anything
about them myself. So I told them its
God’s doing and that’s all. He’ll see
that we’re safe. What can you tell an
illiterate person?
I remember just like today. There was a bunch of Russian boys and girls
visiting at our house. That evening we
were sitting around the table and drinking tea and talking. One of the fellows said goodnight. He was going home. All of a sudden he comes back and he knocked at the window. He said, “Come on out, ladies and gentlemen
and you’ll see something.”
We went outside and looked
around. The comet was there. It was almost as big as the moon. The comet and its tail covered up almost the
whole horizon. It made the night like a
street now looks when the streetlights are on.
It was beautiful.
I still remember as I walked out of
the house it looked to me like the fiery tail was all on me. I wasn’t scared; I was stupefied. I didn’t think of God, I didn’t think of
angels, I didn’t even think of nature.
I thought just of that thing. It
looked like gold. The comet didn’t have
any certain quality. It just looked
like something the imagination would make.
It was a dream. It was like
being in space. It was such an
experience, I’ll never forget it.
Copyright:
Jerred Metz, 1980, Drinking the Dipper Dry: Nine Plain-Spoken Lives. K.M. Gentile, Publisher.