Nowadays a person getting hit by lightning is treated as a freak accident. Before lightning rods were invented were people generally terrified by lightning and likely to get hit by it?
Not people so much as buildings. A lightning rod has an attached cable leading to the ground, allowing a safe path for the electrical charge. Lightning striking a building would cause fire or other damage, an increased risk as buildings got taller, and a single fire could potentially burn down a whole town (see the Great Fire of 1901 that burns down a large portion of Jacksonville, Florida, starting in a mattress factory)