But it isn’t raining rain, you know ... journal Physical Review Letters. That’s neon, as in the ubiquitous neon signs that light up Earth’s night. It’s one of the so-called noble gases ...

In the countryside, people contemplated church steeples, maple trees, clouds. In cities, they gaped at neon — and it was everything. Between the 1930s and the 1970s, neon signs were a potent ...