[meteorite-list] NPA 05-08-1925 Meteorites and Kansas, Nininger

[MARK BOSTICK]

Paper: The Mansfield News
City: Mansfield, Ohio
Date: Friday, May 8, 1925

NOT EVERY METEOR FEEL IT’S OBLIGED TO FALL IN KANSAS

     McPHERSON, Kan., May 8. - (AP) - Kansas has attained a reputation 
beyond this planet as a landing field for stray meteorites, but that 
reputation would not stand the test of science, declared Prof. H. H. 
Nininger of McPherson college, past president of the Kansas Academy of 
Science, in an address on the subject of meteorites.
     The belief that Kansas, center of the United States, exerts some 
unexplained influence on the heavenly wanderers, is without foundation in 
fact, the professor asserted.  A chart of recorded meteorite falls discloses 
that one-fifth of the significant finds in the world have been in Kansas, 
and this has led, according to Professor Nininger , to the popular and 
fallacious impression that this state is peculiarly attractive to 
meteorites.
     Two explanations he offered for the apparent monopoly Kansas has 
maintained: the character of the soil, and the interest aroused in the 
science.
     "The finding of stony meteorites," Professor Nininger pointed out, 
"which have not been seen to fall, may be considered among the rarest events 
in the annals of meteoritics.  In only two localities on this continent have 
such finds occurred in numbers - western Kansas and the coastal plains of 
Texas.  In both of these regions the soil is comparatively free from 
terrestrial rocks."  This, he said, facilitated distinguishing meteoritic 
stones from the earth.
     A series of witnessed falls of the now famous and iron and stone 
meteorites also had kept scientific circles, the public and the press 
interested in Kansas for long periods, he said, with the result that farmers 
began to believe that the heavy stones with which they were weighing down 
fences and roofs were in fact meteorites.  Thus were the discoveries 
multiplied.
     Scientists have never satisfactorily accounted for the concentration of 
iron meteorites in large showers, Professor Nininger told his audience.  One 
theory is that such showers are remnants of disintegrating comets which have 
"side-swiped" the earth.  This, he said, may explain the huge crater in 
northeast Arizona, devoid of volcanic rock and surrounded by traces of iron 
meteoritic falls, which geologists believe marks the entrance into the earth 
of a monster meteorite.

(end)

Clear Skies,
Mark Bostick
Wichita, Kansas
http://www.meteoritearticles.com
http://www.kansasmeteoritesociety.com
http://www.imca.cc

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PDF copy of this article, and most I post (and about 1/2 of those on my 
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The NPA in the subject line, stands for Newspaper Article. The old list 
server allowed us a search feature the current does not, so I guess this is 
more for quick reference and shortening the subject line now.