The night sky on the night of Edison's public demonstration of electric light — 31 December 1879
On New Year's Eve 1879 Thomas Edison opened his Menlo Park laboratory in New Jersey to the public and lit the buildings and the grounds around them with his new incandescent lamps. Crowds came, many by train from New York, to see electric light that burned for hours without a flame.
The sky over Menlo Park, New Jersey, USA
This is the real sky above Menlo Park, New Jersey, USA (40.56°N, 74.34°W) on 31 December 1879 at 22:00 local mean time (UTC−4:57) that night (1880-01-01 02:57 UTC). The Sun was 59° below the horizon: it was full night. The Moon (waning gibbous, 89% lit) was 22° up in the east. Planets above the horizon: Mars (58° in the south-west) and Saturn (24° in the west). Brightest named stars up: Sirius, Capella, Rigel, Procyon and Betelgeuse.
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