This morning I was reading the New York Times reports of yesterday’s rare Midwestern earthquake and comments by Chicagoans like this one: “It actually woke me up. And I thought, my bed is shaking! What’s going on?"
I had the same experience in Park Slope in 1985. For four months I’d taken over my friend Judd Silverman’s share in a duplex apartment on President Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenue while he was in Pennsylvania directing plays. On Saturday, October 20, I was sleeping soundly in bed when suddenly the bed started shaking violently enough to wake me up. I looked up and the lighting fixture above was swaying back and forth. It lasted just a few seconds and I drifted back to sleep.
I woke up around 7:30 a.m. and hurried off to a Saturday graduate class in computer education at Teachers College. On the subway I remember musing about that weird dream I’d had about being in an earthquake. It wasn’t until the class took its break after a couple of hours and we headed to the basement cafeteria for snacks that I heard our professor ask, "How’d you like that earthquake this morning?"
I couldn’t believe it was real. When I got back to the Slope, I went over to Sterling Place, where my friend Susan Mernit (now a well-known dot-com entrepreneur in Silicon Valley) lived with her family. She said they’d heard a rumbling noise with the earthquake and the ground shook considerably, if very briefly.
Talking to other people in the neighborhood, I discovered that many people felt the quake and then turned on the radio or TV and got confirmation that there had indeed been an earthquake, preceded by a smaller foreshock.
They struck about two minutes apart shortly after 6 a.m. and were centered in Ardsley in Westchester County. Seismologists at Columbia University said the quake had measured 4.0 on the Richter scale and the foreshock 2.0.
Other people in the Slope, like Judd’s two roommates, seemed to sleep through the whole thing. I was the only one I could find who’d assumed I was dreaming.
I wonder if other Slope residents have memories of that quake. It occurred just three weeks after Hurricane Gloria came through and downed a number of trees and lots of branches in the neighborhood.
Incidentally, the strongest earthquake to hit metro New York was centered right here in Brooklyn on Sunday afternoon, August 10, 1884. Scientists say it was a 5.0 on the Richter scale. Here’s a contemporary newspaper report:
"The policemen on the Brooklyn bridge report that the shock was distinctly felt there, and the great towers at either end oscillated visibly, while the bridge itself rocked as if struck by a hurricane. The shock was felt generally along the river fronts, and the piers were shaken as if by a heavily loaded truck passing over them. At the iron steamboat pier, which is built of solid masonry, the motion was so violent that the ticket-takers rushed from their offices to ascertain the cause of the commotion.
The late afternoon boats brought back crowds from Coney Island, where it was said that the shock was much more violent that in the city. The piazzas and dining-rooms at the Manhattan and Brighton Beach were well filled when a rumbling noise was hear, followed by a rocking of the ground, which made window panes rattle and shock dishes and wine glasses from the tables. There was a general rush for the open air, and great excitement prevailed. There was a general rush toward the main entrance, the people being under the impression that the structure was giving way.
In Brooklyn the earthquake was felt very generally throughout the city. Along the river front and in the eastern district the chock appears to have been heavier and of longer duration. Everywhere people ran from their houses in terror. People in Greenpoint started on a run for the immense oil works which are located on the shore of Newton creek, thinking that an explosion had occurred there, while all the fire companies harnessed their horses in readiness to respond to an alarm of fire, which they thought would soon follow.
The sensation experienced on board the receiving ship Vermont, lying in the Brooklyn navy-yard, was similar to that felt when a broadside is discharged from a ship at some distance. According to the story of one of the sailors, there was a distinctly perceptible jar felt, and it was noticed by all on board. Persons traveling in street cars felt the vibration, and in many instances the wheels of the car seemed to leave the track, producing the same effect as when they pass over a loose switch.
The bell of a Presbyterian church in Greenpoint swayed back and forth and rang several times loud enough to be heard by all the people living in the neighborhood. Among other evidences of the violence of the agitation in Brooklyn may be mentioned the stopping of clocks, the throwing down of a high pile of bricks, the swinging of lamps and pictures and the like. Many of the Sunday-schools were in session at the time, and the teachers had in some instances great difficulty in allaying the fears of the scholars."
Declan Curran from Richmond, Virginia, neees help identifying the WWII crew members in this photo. 
