This Day in Religious History (Followers of Doomsday Prophet Await—for Naught—the Destruction of the World)

December 27, 1908—Followers of Lee Spangler, a modern-day visionary, climbed to the top of Hook Mountain in the upstate village of Nyack, N.Y., in anticipation of the end of the world. The would-be prophet, however, perhaps coming to his senses, decamped at the last minute to his wife and grocery store business back in York, Pa., leaving his acolytes literally and figuratively out in the cold.

Spangler had been haunted by a vision he had had after coming out of a trance at age 12, of the destruction of the world by fire. His ramblings about it soon entranced the notice of newspapermen, who, once they got wind of it and spread the word, brought out the faithful and fearful.

Spangler had set this particular Sunday as the day of doom. Why he thought Nyack would be the best place to observe Armageddon, I have no idea. The Tappan Zee Bridge had not been built at the time. It simply was not a busy burg.

Those inclined to look for signs of end times might have been better advised to look across the Atlantic. On the very same day, major earthquakes struck Sicily and the Italian mainland, taking 85,000 lives. Another earthquake followed the next day, around the Straits of Messina.

Instead, Spangler’s disciples had to put up with a lot of discomfort. Many were so anxious to be present at the destruction, so to speak, that they went without sleep, afraid that they’d miss the first blast at the trumpet that would sound the world’s doom.

The female followers of Spangler, donning white dresses “specially made for the occasion,” according to the subsequent droll account the next day in the The New York Times, proceeded to the railway station. That’s where, they were told, they would meet saints coming at the head of the mighty conflagration.

No such luck—instead, they found themselves taunted by 150 citizens--many, it was rumored, up from New York City and armed with eggs—who followed them to a cemetery before a policeman, not liking what he saw or heard, drove the whole kit ‘n’ caboodle out. They then made one last trip to South Mountain, but again nothing happened.

At the end of all of that, the Times reported, there was a “feeling of strong indignation” in Nyack against Spangler for having made a laughingstock of the town. But by this time, Spangler had escaped under cover of darkness.