Hodges was struck by the meteorite while on her couch on Nov. 30, 1954. She donated it to the University of Alabama's Museum of Natural History in 1956. (Image credit: University of Alabama)
I hope if Ms. Hodges didn't receive any compensation for handing over the meteorite, perhaps some of her family may have, at $7,500 for a 10.3-gram piece in 2017.
I remember the 1957 meteorite which hit off the Louisiana coast. My dad was working as pipe-fitter in a South Louisiana refinery. It lasted long enough for him to come get me inside the house to go see it. It was like day at night.
He guessed correctly that it had landed in the Gulf.
What a good dad!
There was a big atmospheric kaboom over Lake Michigan sometime just before world war one -- people as far inland as Battle Creek ran out of their homes that night, saw the sky lit up almost like daylight, and thought it was the Apocalypse. A big surge of water came up the channel of the Grand River in Grand Haven, and the EMP knocked out at least six power plants (mostly small municipal generators back then) I think in three states.