Why Churches Got the Devil’s Needle #shorts #history #science — Transcript

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1. 0:00He nailed an iron spike to the top of a
2. 0:02church and the whole town said he was
3. 0:04begging for lightning. You see, it's the
4. 0:061760s and whenever a storm rolls in, the
5. 0:09bell ringers ring as hard as they can
6. 0:11because everyone knows the sound scares
7. 0:13lightning away. He's the youngest
8. 0:15blacksmith in town and when the priest
9. 0:17sees a wire running from the spike down
10. 0:19into the dirt, his face goes white.
11. 0:21You're insulting heaven. But he won't
12. 0:23take it down. Across the square, the
13. 0:26cathedral's old bell ringer has rung
14. 0:28through 40 years of storms and people
15. 0:30start calling the little church the
16. 0:31devil's needle.
17. 0:33Then summer comes and something weird
18. 0:35happens. The lightning keeps hitting the
19. 0:37needle. In June it gets hit once and by
20. 0:40August it's been hit four times and the
21. 0:42little church doesn't have a single
22. 0:43scorch mark. The old bell ringer is
23. 0:46delighted. [music]
24. 0:47See, my bells chased it straight to you.
25. 0:50Meanwhile, up in the cathedral, he's
26. 0:52still out ringing every storm, soaked to
27. 0:54the skin, gripping a wet rope that runs
28. 0:56all the way up to a giant bronze bell.
29. 0:59On the worst storm anyone can remember,
30. 1:01the old man rings harder than ever and
31. 1:03the bolt skips the needle and comes
32. 1:05crashing down the cathedral tower, down
33. 1:07the rope and right to his hands.