The Esoteric Art of Felt Reports

In the era before seismic instrumentation became available and reliable the only source of information on earthquakes were the written accounts left by eyewitnesses to the event.  In the modern short hand of seismology they are referred to as felt reports.  These reports  reflected the education and interests of the observers who recorded their observations.  To modern researchers these accounts are a gold mine of information if used properly. The sources of these reports are as varied as the persons who recorded them  They can be in diaries, letters, legal documents, and in almost any written record contemporary with the earthquakes.  One of the most prolific sources of felt reports are contemporary newspapers.  With the effort to catalog and preserve early newspapers came the preservation of vast amounts of written felt reports.  The problem is finding them in the ocean of the surviving printed words.  Many of the accounts that you have seen on the blog are from the effort to find New Madrid felt reports to help better understand the earthquakes.