Didn't realize that there were so many written records back then?
Many residents along the Mississippi experienced vigorous ground shaking and wrote about it in 1811 and 1812. They include visitors to the region soon after the earthquakes. Touch spots on map to read accounts of the devastation.
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No audio: How can a river run backwards? This animation shows how a river can be forced backwards, albeit only long enough to find a new route. Several written accounts from the New Madrid earthquake of 1811 and 1812 describe the horror as great waters swashed upriver causing lakes to form on previously dry land.
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