1791: "The Night Lake Erie Rose”

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Written By JC
1791: "The Night Lake Erie Rose - The October Suprise of 1844"
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Interesting Things with JC #1791:

"The Night Lake Erie Rose"

In October 1844, powerful winds reversed across Lake Erie and sent water surging into Buffalo and Hamburg NY, flooding neighborhoods, destroying buildings and driving canal boats into city streets in one of the region’s worst early maritime disasters.

This was the original “October Suprise”.

Curriculum - Episode Anchor

Episode Title: The Night Lake Erie Rose
Episode Number: 1791
Host: JC
Audience: Grades 9–12, introductory college, homeschool, lifelong learners
Subject Area: Earth science, physics, Great Lakes geography, Buffalo history, environmental science, historical research
Estimated Lesson Time: 45–70 minutes
Primary Concept: Strong winds can redistribute enormous volumes of water across Lake Erie, producing storm surge and subsequent seiche oscillations capable of rapidly changing shoreline water levels.
Historical Anchor: Buffalo, New York, October 18, 1844
Essential Question: How can wind move enough water across a lake to flood a city?

Learning Objectives

Students will be able to:

  • Define seiche, storm surge, wind setup, standing wave, oscillation, and atmospheric pressure.

  • Explain how strong winds redistribute water across Lake Erie.

  • Distinguish a seiche from a tsunami.

  • Interpret historical descriptions using modern scientific knowledge.

  • Explain why Lake Erie is especially susceptible to large wind-driven water-level changes.

  • Evaluate historical measurements and casualty estimates when sources disagree.

  • Connect the 1844 Buffalo disaster to modern Great Lakes coastal hazards.

Lesson Overview

On October 18, 1844, a destructive water-level event struck Buffalo after powerful winds moved Lake Erie’s water across its basin. Modern sources commonly identify the disaster as a major Lake Erie seiche event, with approximately 78 deaths reported by NOAA and New York Sea Grant. NOAA describes a seiche as a standing wave oscillating within an enclosed or partially enclosed body of water. Strong winds and atmospheric-pressure changes can push water toward one end of a basin; when the forcing changes, the water can rebound and oscillate.

Lake Erie is particularly responsive to this process because it is comparatively shallow and elongated west to east. NOAA research describes southwest winds as capable of raising water levels near Buffalo while simultaneously lowering them toward Toledo. The lake therefore behaves somewhat like an enormous container in which wind can temporarily tilt the water surface.

This lesson combines physical science with historical analysis. Students examine how a natural process became a human disaster in a growing nineteenth-century port city, while also learning why historical descriptions such as “a dam had broken away” should be interpreted as eyewitness language rather than precise scientific measurement.

Big Ideas

  • Wind can produce substantial short-term changes in Great Lakes water levels.

  • A seiche is an oscillation, not simply a single incoming wave.

  • Lake geometry and depth affect water movement.

  • Historical eyewitness accounts provide valuable evidence but require contextual interpretation.

  • Scientific terminology can allow later generations to explain events that earlier observers could describe but not fully quantify.

Key Vocabulary

  • Seiche — “saysh”: A standing-wave oscillation within an enclosed or partially enclosed body of water. NOAA notes that winds and rapid changes in atmospheric pressure commonly initiate seiches.

  • Standing wave: A wave pattern in which locations within the basin repeatedly experience characteristic rises and falls rather than a single wave simply traveling through and disappearing.

  • Wind setup: The increase in water level produced when sustained wind pushes water toward the downwind end of a lake.

  • Storm surge: An abnormal rise in water level associated with strong winds and atmospheric conditions during a storm.

  • Oscillation: Repeated movement back and forth around an equilibrium condition.

  • Atmospheric pressure: The force exerted by the weight of the atmosphere; pressure differences can contribute to water-level displacement.

  • Basin: The physical depression containing a lake or other body of water.

  • Fetch: The distance over which wind blows across open water.

  • Tsunami — “soo-NAH-mee”: A series of waves usually generated by sudden displacement of water from earthquakes, landslides, volcanic activity, or similar disturbances. It is physically different from a typical wind-driven Great Lakes seiche.

  • Primary source: Evidence created during the period being studied, such as newspapers, letters, diaries, government records, or eyewitness accounts.

  • Secondary source: Later interpretation based on primary evidence and other research.

  • Uncertainty: The recognized limits of a measurement, reconstruction, estimate, or conclusion.

Narrative Core

Buffalo in 1844 was a rapidly growing transportation center where Lake Erie connected with the Erie Canal. Waterfront neighborhoods, ships, canal boats, warehouses, wharves, and homes stood close to the lake.

Strong northeast winds preceding the disaster pushed Lake Erie’s water toward its western end. When the wind pattern changed, powerful southwest winds drove water eastward toward Buffalo.

Modern hydrodynamics helps explain the process. Wind transfers momentum to the water surface. Because Lake Erie stretches primarily west to east, sustained winds aligned with the long axis of the lake can create large differences in water elevation between Toledo and Buffalo. NOAA documentation describes the ends of Lake Erie as experiencing much larger short-term fluctuations than locations near the lake’s center.

On October 18, 1844, the resulting rise became catastrophic in Buffalo. NOAA describes the event as a 22-foot seiche and reports 78 fatalities. New York Sea Grant likewise identifies the October 1844 event as the most destructive documented seiche in Western New York and cites 78 deaths.

The 22-foot figure requires careful interpretation. It should not automatically be visualized as a single 22-foot vertical wall of water striking the city. Seiche magnitude, water-level differences across the basin, storm surge, waves, local flooding depths, shoreline geometry, and historical measurement methods describe different aspects of the event.

That distinction illustrates a broader scientific principle: dramatic historical numbers must be interpreted according to what was actually measured.

The physics remains relevant. New York Sea Grant reports that seiche events occur on Lake Erie roughly every one to two years and can cause coastal flooding, shoreline erosion, and dangerous currents. During such events, water can accumulate along the eastern shoreline while levels fall toward the western end.

Photographic-style historical recreation of Lake Erie along the Hamburg, New York shoreline during a powerful storm, with rough waves crashing into wooden docks and shoreline structures near Hoak’s. Text reads: “Interesting Things with JC #1791” and “The Night Lake Erie Rose.”

Transcript

Interesting Things with JC #1791:

"The Night Lake Erie Rose"

On the night of October 18, 1844, people sleeping near Buffalo’s waterfront had almost no warning that Lake Erie was about to come into their homes.

For several days, strong northeast winds had pushed water toward the western end of the lake. Then the wind abruptly reversed. A violent southwest gale began driving water back toward Buffalo, at Lake Erie’s narrow eastern end.

The result was an enormous storm-driven surge and seiche, pronounced “saysh.”

Water rushed into the lower parts of Buffalo so quickly that contemporary accounts described neighborhoods under 2 to 8 feet, or about 0.6 to 2.4 meters, of water within roughly half an hour. One account described an advancing wave about 4 feet, or 1.2 meters, deep.

Later accounts sometimes associate the event with a water-level difference approaching 22 feet, or 6.7 meters, across Lake Erie. That does not mean a 22-foot wall of water struck Buffalo. A federal engineering account reported flooding at Buffalo roughly 10 feet, or 3 meters, above the lake’s ordinary level.

Buildings were torn apart. Wharves and harbor defenses were damaged. Canal boats were carried into city streets. Contemporary reporting counted more than 100 buildings destroyed and more than 80 canal boats driven ashore between Buffalo and Black Rock.

The exact death toll varies among historical sources, although modern Great Lakes references commonly cite 78 deaths.

And this wasn’t a tsunami.

A seiche happens when wind and atmospheric pressure move water across an enclosed or partly enclosed body of water. When conditions change, the displaced water can oscillate back across the basin, much like water sloshing from one end of a bathtub to the other.

Lake Erie is particularly susceptible because it is the shallowest Great Lake. Powerful winds can produce dramatic differences in water level between its western and eastern ends.

Buffalo newspapers in 1844 didn’t need the modern terminology. They described what people saw when the water came rushing back toward the city:

It was as though “a dam had broken away.”

More than 180 years later, Lake Erie still produces seiches. The physics that devastated Buffalo in 1844 never went away.

These are interesting things, with JC.

Student Worksheet

Comprehension

  1. On what date did the 1844 disaster occur?

  2. What happened to the wind direction immediately before the major rise in water at Buffalo?

  3. What is a seiche?

  4. Why is Lake Erie particularly susceptible to large wind-driven changes in water level?

  5. What modern death toll is commonly cited for the 1844 event?

  6. What kinds of structures and vessels were damaged or displaced?

Cause and Effect

  1. Complete the sequence: northeast winds → water displaced westward → wind reversal → __________ → Buffalo water level rises.

  2. Explain how wind transfers energy and momentum to lake water.

  3. Why would Buffalo and Toledo experience greater water-level fluctuations than locations nearer Lake Erie’s center?

  4. Explain why the bathtub comparison is useful for understanding a seiche.

Historical Evidence

  1. Why should an eyewitness statement such as “a dam had broken away” not automatically be treated as a scientific measurement?

  2. What information would you want before interpreting a historical claim that the water “rose 22 feet”?

  3. Why might death totals from an 1844 disaster differ between sources?

  4. Identify one advantage and one limitation of nineteenth-century newspaper accounts.

Science Comparison

  1. Explain one important difference between a tsunami and a seiche.

  2. Is a seiche simply one large wave? Explain your answer.

  3. What happens after water that has been pushed toward one end of a lake is released from the force holding it there?

  4. Why does the shape of Lake Erie matter?

Quantitative Reasoning

  1. Convert 22 feet to meters using 1 foot = 0.3048 meters.

  2. Convert 10 feet to meters.

  3. If a location experienced 8 feet of flooding, approximately how many meters of water would that represent?

  4. Lake Erie has an average depth of roughly 62 feet, or about 19 meters. Explain why that comparatively shallow depth affects its response to strong winds.

Analysis

  1. Evaluate the statement: “A 22-foot seiche means Buffalo was hit by a 22-foot wall of water.”

  2. Explain how the 1844 event demonstrates interactions between the atmosphere and hydrosphere.

  3. How could modern water-level gauges, weather radar, satellites, and forecasting change the outcome of a comparable event today?

  4. What elements of nineteenth-century Buffalo made the waterfront especially vulnerable?

Reflection

  1. Why might residents living beside a large freshwater lake underestimate the possibility of rapid water-level changes?

  2. What does the 1844 event show about the value of studying historical natural disasters?

  3. Explain how scientific terminology can change our understanding of a historical eyewitness account.

Student Output: Write a 300–500 word explanation answering: “How did weather conditions turn Lake Erie itself into a hazard for Buffalo in 1844?” Include at least three pieces of evidence from the transcript or assigned sources.

Academic Integrity Guidance: Students should distinguish quoted historical language from their own analysis, identify the source of quantitative claims, and acknowledge uncertainty when historical measurements disagree.

Teacher Guide

Quick Start: Play or read the episode once without interruption. Ask students to identify what physically moved the lake water before introducing the term seiche.

Pacing Guide — Audio First

  1. 0–5 minutes: Play or read the episode.

  2. 5–10 minutes: Students write a one-sentence explanation of what they think happened.

  3. 10–20 minutes: Introduce seiche, wind setup, standing wave, and oscillation.

  4. 20–30 minutes: Diagram Lake Erie with Toledo at the western end and Buffalo at the eastern end.

  5. 30–40 minutes: Work through worksheet questions 7–18.

  6. 40–50 minutes: Compare eyewitness language with modern NOAA explanations.

  7. 50–60 minutes: Complete quantitative questions and discussion.

  8. 60–70 minutes: Written assessment or extension.

Materials

  • Episode transcript

  • Map of Lake Erie

  • Student worksheet

  • NOAA seiche explanation

  • New York Sea Grant Lake Erie seiche materials

  • Optional shallow tray or clear container of water for demonstration

Simple Demonstration

  1. Partially fill a rectangular transparent container with water.

  2. Gently tilt or move the container so water accumulates toward one end.

  3. Return it to level.

  4. Observe the water oscillating between ends.

  5. Ask students which parts of the demonstration approximate wind setup and which approximate a free oscillation.

Safety Note: Keep water demonstrations away from electrical equipment and use only shallow quantities of water.

Discussion Prompts

  • Why does “sloshing” accurately describe part of the process without fully describing the physics?

  • How can a freshwater lake generate water-level changes large enough to damage a city?

  • Why must historical measurements be interpreted carefully?

  • How does modern instrumentation improve disaster reconstruction?

  • What distinguishes scientific explanation from eyewitness description?

Common Misconceptions

  • Misconception: A seiche is a freshwater tsunami.
    Correction: Both involve significant water movement, but their mechanisms differ. Seiches are standing oscillations commonly driven by wind and atmospheric conditions in enclosed or semi-enclosed basins. NOAA explicitly distinguishes seiches from meteotsunamis and tsunami-like progressive waves.

  • Misconception: Lake Erie has meaningful ocean-like tides.
    Correction: NOAA notes that astronomical tides on the Great Lakes are very small and are overwhelmed by weather-driven water-level changes.

  • Misconception: “22-foot seiche” means a uniform 22-foot wall of water hit every part of Buffalo.
    Correction: Water-level differences, setup, wave height, flooding depth, and elevation above datum are not interchangeable measurements.

  • Misconception: Seiches are extremely rare.
    Correction: New York Sea Grant reports that Lake Erie experiences seiche events approximately every one to two years, although most are far less destructive than 1844.

Formative Checkpoints

  • Student correctly identifies wind as the primary forcing mechanism.

  • Student distinguishes forced water displacement from subsequent oscillation.

  • Student correctly places Buffalo at Lake Erie’s eastern end.

  • Student avoids equating the 22-foot figure with a single breaking wave.

  • Student can distinguish primary-source description from scientific measurement.

Differentiation

  • Additional Support: Provide a labeled west-east Lake Erie diagram showing Toledo and Buffalo.

  • Advanced Learners: Have students investigate resonance, basin geometry, and the natural oscillation period of Lake Erie.

  • English Learners: Preteach seiche, oscillation, basin, surge, displacement, and eyewitness.

  • Homeschool: Reproduce the shallow-water demonstration and have the student narrate the sequence using scientific vocabulary.

  • Introductory College: Compare contemporary newspaper reporting with modern NOAA and Sea Grant descriptions and evaluate how terminology changed.

Answer Key

  1. October 18, 1844.

  2. Winds shifted from northeast to strong southwest.

  3. A standing-wave oscillation within an enclosed or semi-enclosed body of water.

  4. Its shallow depth and long west-east geometry make it highly responsive to winds aligned with the basin.

  5. 78 deaths is commonly cited by NOAA and New York Sea Grant.

  6. Buildings, wharves, harbor structures, ships, and canal boats.

  7. Water driven eastward.

  8. Wind stress acts on the water surface and transfers momentum.

  9. The ends of an oscillating basin generally experience larger vertical changes than locations nearer the node or central region.

  10. Water displaced toward one end rebounds and oscillates.

  11. It is descriptive eyewitness language rather than an instrument-derived measurement.

  12. Measurement location, datum, whether the figure refers to setup, total difference across the basin, wave height, or local flood depth, and how it was measured.

  13. Incomplete records, missing persons, differing geographic boundaries, inconsistent contemporary reporting, and later reinterpretation.

  14. Advantage: immediate evidence. Limitation: limited instrumentation, incomplete information, and possible exaggeration or ambiguity.

  15. Typical seiches are standing oscillations in enclosed basins often driven by weather; tsunamis generally originate from sudden displacement such as earthquakes.

  16. No. A seiche involves repeated oscillation within the basin.

  17. Gravity pulls the elevated water back, producing continued oscillation.

  18. Basin length, depth, orientation, and shoreline geometry influence its response.

  19. 6.7056 meters, approximately 6.7 meters.

  20. 3.048 meters, approximately 3.0 meters.

  21. 2.4384 meters, approximately 2.4 meters.

  22. Shallower water allows wind stress to produce substantial basin-wide redistribution of water.

  23. Incorrect or oversimplified; the number does not necessarily represent a single vertical breaking wave at Buffalo.

  24. Atmospheric winds transfer energy into the hydrosphere and redistribute water.

  25. They provide detection, measurement, prediction, communication, and evacuation time.

  26. Dense waterfront development, vessels, wharves, low-lying land, limited warning systems, and nineteenth-century construction.
    27–29. Answers should demonstrate evidence-based reasoning.

Quiz

Multiple Choice

  1. A seiche is best defined as:
    A. A daily astronomical tide
    B. A standing-wave oscillation in a body of water
    C. An underwater earthquake
    D. A river flood

  2. Buffalo lies near which end of Lake Erie?
    A. Western
    B. Northern
    C. Eastern
    D. Southern

  3. What primarily caused the dramatic water-level changes described in the episode?
    A. Lunar tides
    B. Glacial melting
    C. Strong winds and changing atmospheric conditions
    D. Volcanic activity

  4. Why is Lake Erie especially responsive to strong winds?
    A. It is the deepest Great Lake.
    B. It is shallow and elongated along a west-east axis.
    C. It has no outlet.
    D. It is below sea level.

  5. What modern death toll is commonly cited for the 1844 disaster?
    A. 12
    B. 34
    C. 78
    D. 220

  6. A historical statement describing the water as if “a dam had broken away” is best classified as:
    A. Instrumental measurement
    B. Eyewitness description
    C. Mathematical model
    D. Satellite observation

  7. What happens after wind-driven water is released from one end of a basin?
    A. It permanently remains there.
    B. It may oscillate across the basin.
    C. It immediately evaporates.
    D. It becomes groundwater.

  8. Why must the 22-foot figure be interpreted carefully?
    A. Feet did not exist as a unit in 1844.
    B. The number may describe a water-level difference or seiche magnitude rather than a uniform breaking wave.
    C. Lake Erie is less than 22 feet deep everywhere.
    D. No records survive.

  9. Which Earth systems interact most directly during the event?
    A. Biosphere and lithosphere only
    B. Atmosphere and hydrosphere
    C. Magnetosphere and biosphere
    D. Mantle and inner core

  10. Which modern technology would most directly help forecast a similar event?
    A. Water-level gauges and meteorological forecasting
    B. Carbon dating
    C. Seismographs alone
    D. Archaeological excavation

Answer Key: 1-B, 2-C, 3-C, 4-B, 5-C, 6-B, 7-B, 8-B, 9-B, 10-A.

Assessment

Short Response — 20 Points

Students respond to:

“Explain how strong winds can cause major flooding at one end of Lake Erie without rainfall being the primary cause.”

Scoring Rubric

  • 4 — Advanced: Accurately explains wind setup, east-west water displacement, basin geometry, subsequent oscillation, and uses evidence from the 1844 event.

  • 3 — Proficient: Correctly explains wind-driven displacement and identifies Buffalo’s location at the eastern end.

  • 2 — Developing: Recognizes that wind moved the water but gives an incomplete mechanism.

  • 1 — Beginning: Provides a vague or substantially incorrect explanation.

  • 0 — No Evidence: No relevant response.

Source Analysis — 20 Points

Students compare the historical phrase “a dam had broken away” with NOAA’s modern definition of a seiche.

Evaluate:

  • Historical context — 5 points

  • Scientific interpretation — 5 points

  • Evidence use — 5 points

  • Recognition of measurement uncertainty — 5 points

Extended Response — 40 Points

Prompt:

“Using the 1844 Buffalo disaster as a case study, explain how geography, weather, physics, and human settlement combined to produce a natural disaster.”

Evaluation Criteria

  • Accurate physical mechanism — 10 points

  • Historical evidence — 10 points

  • Geographic reasoning — 10 points

  • Clear, evidence-based writing — 10 points

Mastery Benchmark: 64/80 points, or 80%.

Standards Alignment

NGSS — Science & Engineering Practices

  • HS-ESS2-2 — Earth's Systems: Analyze geoscience data to make claims about interactions and changes among Earth systems. Students interpret how atmospheric forcing changed Lake Erie water levels and affected the shoreline. The official NGSS performance expectation requires analysis of geoscience data and interactions within Earth systems.

  • Analyzing and Interpreting Data: Students compare water-level measurements, historical descriptions, and modern scientific explanations rather than treating every number as equivalent. NGSS explicitly identifies analyzing and interpreting data as a high-school science practice associated with HS-ESS2-2.

  • Developing and Using Models: Students model the Lake Erie basin as an elongated body of water experiencing wind setup and subsequent oscillation.

  • Cause and Effect: Students establish the causal sequence from wind direction and duration to water displacement, shoreline flooding, and oscillation.

  • Systems and System Models: Lake Erie is treated as a basin interacting with atmospheric forces and shoreline environments.

  • Stability and Change: Students analyze how an apparently stable lake level can undergo rapid temporary change under strong meteorological forcing.

CCSS Reading — Science and Technical Subjects

  • CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RST.9-10.1 — Cite specific textual evidence to support analysis of science and technical texts. Students support explanations of seiche formation with NOAA and Sea Grant evidence.

  • CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RST.9-10.2 — Determine central ideas or conclusions and trace a complex process or phenomenon. Students reconstruct the physical sequence that produced the Buffalo event.

  • CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RST.9-10.4 — Determine meaning of domain-specific scientific and technical vocabulary. Students interpret seiche, oscillation, wind setup, surge, and atmospheric pressure.

  • CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RST.9-10.7 — Translate quantitative or technical information between verbal and visual forms. Students convert measurements and create a basin diagram showing water displacement.

  • CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RST.11-12.1 — Cite specific textual evidence while attending to distinctions, gaps, or inconsistencies. Advanced students evaluate differing historical measurements and casualty estimates.

CCSS Reading — History/Social Studies

  • CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RH.9-10.1 — Cite specific textual evidence from primary and secondary sources while attending to date and origin. Students distinguish 1844 eyewitness descriptions from later scientific reconstruction.

  • CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RH.9-10.2 — Determine central ideas or information and provide an accurate summary. Students summarize the historical event without confusing later interpretation with contemporary knowledge.

  • CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RH.9-10.3 — Analyze a series of events and determine causal relationships. Students distinguish events that caused later conditions from events that merely occurred earlier.

CCSS Writing

  • CCSS.ELA-Literacy.WHST.9-10.2 — Write informative/explanatory texts about historical events and scientific or technical processes. Students explain seiche formation using the 1844 disaster as evidence.

  • CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.9-10.2 — Write informative/explanatory texts that clearly convey complex ideas. Student responses combine historical evidence, geography, and physical science.

C3 Framework Connections

  • D2.His.1.9-12: Evaluate how historical events were shaped by broader contexts.

  • D2.His.10.9-12: Detect possible limitations in historical records based on evidence available from the time.

  • D2.Geo.4.9-12: Analyze relationships between environmental characteristics and human activity.

  • D2.Geo.12.9-12: Evaluate consequences of human-made and natural catastrophes for particular places and populations.

ISTE Student Connections

  • 1.3 Knowledge Constructor: Students evaluate multiple digital and historical sources.

  • 1.5 Computational Thinker: Students organize physical variables and causal relationships into a system model.

  • 1.6 Creative Communicator: Students communicate a complex Earth-science process using diagrams and concise explanatory writing.

Bloom’s Taxonomy

  • Remember: Define seiche and storm surge.

  • Understand: Describe the wind-driven mechanism.

  • Apply: Interpret the process using a Lake Erie map.

  • Analyze: Compare measurements and eyewitness descriptions.

  • Evaluate: Assess the reliability and meaning of historical evidence.

  • Create: Construct an evidence-based explanation or physical model.

Show Notes

On October 18, 1844, powerful winds drove Lake Erie toward Buffalo and produced one of Western New York’s most destructive historical waterfront disasters.

The event is commonly described today as a major seiche, a standing-wave oscillation that can develop when strong winds and atmospheric-pressure changes redistribute water across an enclosed or partially enclosed basin. NOAA notes that Lake Erie is particularly susceptible to these events, and modern Great Lakes research continues to document significant wind-driven water-level changes along the Buffalo shoreline.

The episode provides a useful interdisciplinary case study involving atmospheric science, hydrology, wave behavior, Great Lakes geography, Buffalo history, historical sources, measurement uncertainty, and coastal hazard preparedness. This episode is dedicated to Nick, Nate, Andy, and Kevin.

Key Takeaway: The 1844 disaster was not an ocean tsunami entering Lake Erie. It was produced by the interaction of strong weather systems with the geometry and water of Lake Erie itself.

Free Curriculum: Free curriculum materials available on the website, no login, no paywall.

Watch: https://youtube.com/@interestingthingswithjc‍ ‍
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References

JC https://jimconnors.org
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1790: "Physics: Position vs. Time"