In the late summer of 1954, a brilliant young psychologist was reading the newspaper when his eye fell on a strange headline on the back page: prophecy from planet clarion call to city: flee that flood. it’ll swamp us on dec 21, outer space tells suburbanite. His interest piqued, the psychologist, whose name was Leon Festinger, read on. “Lake City will be destroyed by a flood from Great Lake just before dawn, Dec. 21.