As we eagerly await the next great end-of-world event, be it predicted by the Mayan calendar or some obscure religious prophecy, it would be beneficial to look back on such cataclysmic non-events of years past. When, for example, a comet that made its appearance regularly in the night sky, and whose orbit was calculated out by British Astronomer Edward Halley, was scheduled to make one of its closest passes to earth, the entire land of the West went in a panic.

On this day, May 10, 1910, Halley’s Comet again appeared in the night sky, beginning its panic-stoking approach toward the earth. With the comet’s tail calculated out to brush through the upper atmosphere, the deadly cyanide gas found it contained was predicted to leech out.

Tracked through the headlines of that week, the observance of the comet’s passing seems similar to the way potentially world-ending events are marked today. Revelers on New York City rooftops organized “Comet parties”; the entire city of Boston agreed to sound fire alarms if the comet became visible. People bought gas masks and oxygen tanks to attempt to prolong life just a little. Elsewhere in Europe, on the last night before the comet was supposed to sweep through, crowds packed in Saint Peter’s Square in Rome to pray for salvation.