The Wow! Signal — 37 seconds in 1977 and then 40 years of silence until maybe 2016

August 15, 1977. Big Ear Radio Observatory at Ohio State. Astronomer Jerry Ehman is reviewing printouts of radio telescope data and circles an anomaly and writes 'Wow!' in the margin. The signal — 72 seconds of reception, narrow-band, 1420 MHz which is the hydrogen line, which is what you'd use if y……