Who Cut The Lights Out?
The above photograph captures exactly what I remember about the morning after the blackout in the summer of 1977. I was 3.
The morning in my imagination, however, had a little bit more to it. There were shadows of what looked like unidentified flying objects, hovering in the sky over our neighborhood in a golden haze, seemingly waiting and watching. I opened my eyes and froze only for a moment, completely scared yet amazed by what I saw. I got up from the middle of the living room floor where my entire family slept that night — me, my two older brothers and my parents. I walked over to the living room window and stared silently.
And then I woke up.
I got up and walked toward the living room window and noticed the silhouette of high rise buildings directly across the street, off in the golden, hazy distance. The aromatics from the Stella Doro cookie factory on Broadway mixed in with fumes from the little Peanut factory just down the street, perfectly graced the summer air.
But — no flying saucers.
There wasn’t exactly a need for all of us to take refuge in the living room together. It’s not like we lived in a one room shack. We all had our own bedrooms. My parents must have been incredibly spooked to decide we all had to stay together through the night. The son of Sam thing and the heightened criminal intensity in the streets more than likely made that decision necessary.
I don’t know what sparked this memory, but it made me think about the one rare instance where my family was all together at one time, in one room. If anything was going to go down that night, at least we were together. All of us. It brought a tear to my eye at that moment, and still makes me want to tear up even now. I don’t think that ever happened again since then.
It also provoked me to want to search for answers. And because I’m probably what they call a conspiracy buff, I immediately wanted to know…..
What were they hiding that day?
I gathered my thoughts and set sail for another adventure down another rabbit hole. I googled for what seemed like hours. I came across a lot of nostalgic photographs and news articles. I sifted through countless links of astronomical occurrences on July 13, 1977.
My search resulted in the simplest conclusion that all the articles seemed to have shared — a circuit blew. That’s it. No heavy complicated details. Nothing exciting. Somebody clumsily tripped over the master electrical chord and yanked it out from the socket.
I was going to end my search there — until I stumbled over the infamous “WOW!” signal (read more here).
As fascinating as it was, this signal and its cause didn’t exactly happen on the day of the blackout. But August 15, 1977 — approximately one month afterwards — is pretty friggin close.
I’ll take it.
If you were even alive back then, or have heard any tall tales about that year’s summer, please feel free to share your stories below — I would love to hear them!
