Pebbles that rain down.
According to a Western paper, a family at Akron, Ohio, are pestered by a mystery. Pebbles and stones are thrown at them by invisible hands during the day, and at night these missiles rattle on the roof like hail. Mrs Michael Metzler was husking corn one day, when something or somebody began to pelt her with stones and clods of earth. She ran home and into the house with a rain of stones at her heels. She was struck and her children were struck.
In the house, with the doors and windows all closed, stones fell at Metzler’s feet, and seemed to come through the ceiling. Mrs Metzler doesn’t believe in spirits, but she does believe in the stones that strike her in the face and on the head.
A priest went to her house to pray that the mischief might be stopped. Some stones fell from the ceiling to his feet, and one struck him, admonishing him to leave off his exhortations. So the priest was stoned out of the house, and the pest has not abated nor has the puzzle been solved.
A reporter went to see and feel if there was any such thing. He was pelted with stones too, and picked some of them up and carried them away in proof of his statement.
Dundee Courier, 9th December 1878.