Taffy? Nah:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt_water_taffy#Origins
I love Turner’s paintings, but there’s no citation in the wikipedia page (or one of those undermining “who sez” disclaimer links as are found in so many other wikipages) for the claim that the “year without a summer” influenced some of his paintings. The claim is often found on sites that promote the global warming hoax. Turner had a notable painting of 1815, Crossing The Brook, nothing about the sky suggests volcanism:
http://www.tate.org.uk/art/images/work/N/N00/N00497_9.jpg
In 1817 he painted or unveiled “Eruption of Vesuvius”, the subject of which was, of course, a volcanic eruption, it could hardly look differently than it does. It’s his conception of the 79 AD eruption:
While his work evolved, he really got into skies as if they were landscapes, and did so quite early:
Tambora’s eruption was about ten times larger than Mount Pinatubo (when I looked it up the other day, the source said “an order of magnitude”), but that would be (probably) in three dimensions, so, approximately the cube root of ten. Pinatubo’s sulfur dioxide output was large, so, some contribution to acid rain, but 1991 doesn’t stick out in memory as a period of worldwide crop failures, famine, and panic in agriiculture. Krakatoa created some pretty sunsets, and produced some tsunamis, but those waves didn’t kill all over the Earth, just in the region.
https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/krakatoa-erupts
[snip] Krakatoa in 1883 date to May 20 when there were initial rumblings and venting from the volcano, which had been dormant for about 200 years. Over the next three months, there were regular small blasts from Krakatoa out of three vents. On August 11, ash started spewing from the small mountain. Eruptions got progressively stronger until August 26, when the catastrophe began. At noon, the volcano sent an ash cloud 20 miles into the air and tremors triggered several tsunamis. This turned out to be just a small indication, however, of what would follow the next day. For four-and-a-half hours beginning at 5:30 a.m. on August 27, there were four major and incredibly powerful eruptions. The last of these made the loudest sound ever recorded on the planet. It could be heard as far away as central Australia and the island of Rodrigues, 3,000 miles from Krakatoa. The air waves created by the eruption were detected at points all over the earth. [/snip]
Years ago I read that the big boom was heard by some people in Japan, at that distance it is amazing, but wouldn’t have been load any longer. Any kind of big eruption noise could cause fluctuations on the barometers, with the effect being much stronger near the eruption. I’m glad the formation of islands by volcano are easy to avoid where I live. :^)
I decided to look up “turner, english artist” and found a bunch of his paintings with dates on them. It appears that the brightest skies he painted were between 1835 and 1845, so I will have to check to see if there was significant volcanic activity in those years, especially Iceland which would be more likely to affect English skies. Cheers and happy Thanksgiving.
