moonandbarn, photo by Aunt Owwee.

Spring is storm season in Michigan, and where there’s storms, there’s often lightning. One of my favorite blogs, The Everyday Adventurer, has a post about lightning rods that I’ve been meaning to feature. I was waiting for a nice spring storm to rumble through but it looks like the April showers are sleeping in this year.

Wikipedia’s Lightning rod entry explains Ben Franklin’s US invention of the lightning rod (which appears to have been invented in Russia 20 some years before). Like many new inventions, it drew criticism. Here’s what Rev. Thomas Prince, the rector of Old South Church in Boston, said in his 1755 sermon titled Earthquakes the Works of God and Tokens of His Just Displeasure:

“…the more points of Iron are erected round the Earth, to draw the Electrical Substance out of the Air; the more the Earth must needs be charged with it. And therefore it seems worthy of Consideration whether any part of the Earth, being fuller of the terrible Substance, may not be exposed to more shocking Earthquakes. In Boston are more erected than anywhere else in New England; and Boston seems to be more dreadfully Shaken. O! there is no getting out of the mighty Hand of God! If we think to avoid it in the Air, we cannot in the Earth: Yea it may grow more fatal…

Check out this Michigan lightning slideshow from Flickr and be sure to check this out bigger.

Here’s hoping your buildings remain lightning free!