The Leonid Tendrils of 1833 — what 'fell from the sky' and why the descriptions don't match meteors

The Leonid meteor storm of November 12-13, 1833 is one of the most documented astronomical events of the 19th century. Contemporary accounts describe 'tens of thousands' of meteors per hour visible from North America. The Smithsonian has a whole archive on this. What I want to talk about are the fri……