  My island is an active volcano, so earthquakes are common. We have one or two large ones a year, and maybe a couple light ones every month or so. They never get any larger than 6 on the Richter Scale, except for a 7.1 in the late 1800s. For example, this chart is updated as of today: urlLink Earthquakes in the last two weeks&nbsp; urlLink So, this shows that in the last two weeks, there were a couple of earthquakes, so you can imagine over the course of a year, how many there are. We don’t even get under our desks or anything at school. The teacher usually stops class until everything stops shaking, the kids giggle, and the lesson continues.
We do have some larger ones as well however. Here is a chart depicting recent earthquakes near the Big Island from 1962-89. You can see that there are several that are over 5.5. urlLink Total Earthquakes from 1962-89&nbsp; urlLink Here is a house destroyed in 89 by an earthquake that was a 6.1. urlLink House&nbsp; urlLink The point is that living on a volcano for most of my life, I am familiar with earthquakes and what they feel like.
Which is why I was slightly confused that last night, while I was watching the movie, Along Came Polly, I felt my sofa start to shake. I muted the television, and listened to my glasses rattling in the cupboards, and in about 10 seconds, all was quiet again. No alarm mind you, the earthquake probably was light enough that had I been asleep, I don’t even think I would have woken up.
The Epicenter was 150 miles East of Iowa city, and registered at a 4.5. urlLink Earthquake Last Night&nbsp; urlLink I know California and Alaska are the site of many quakes, but the Midwest? So, using the Google, I started to do some research on earthquakes in the Midwest. Apparently, we live in a large seismic zone called the Lincoln Anticline. What is an anticline? It looks like this. urlLink An Anticline&nbsp; urlLink I hope that I have been informative in your quest for knowledge about Midwest earthquakes. For any of you interested in the story: http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/Midwest/06/28/chicago.quake.ap/index.html 
