Percival+Lowell

Emily Castle  Astronomy Project Percival Lowell

Percival Lowell was born March 13, 1855 in Boston, Massachusetts. The Lowell family was “one of the oldest, wealthiest, and most distinguished families in America” (Sheehan and O’Meara 127). He attended Harvard University where he studied mathematics, physics and classics, and history. Percival was headed down the road to participate in politics, however; his career path changed drastically. He always had the passion for astronomy since he was a youngster, and it seems that it never escaped him. [1,5]

 The Lowell family was very fortunate thus Percival was able to attend extremely prestigious private schools. His interest in astronomy started young, and it clearly blossomed as he became older. He was very intrigued by astronomy, and remembers the sight of the Comet Donati of 1858. Percival remembers the night and says, “I can see yet a small boy half way up a turning staircase gazing with all his soul into the evening sky where the stranger stood (Sheehan and O’Meara 128). He had a passion, and the young boy eventually made some of the greatest discoveries in science. When he got older his passion grew, and established a little setup in the Lowell’s roof area. They had a cupula, a small structure atop the roof, and he positioned his 2.25-inch refractor within the area. There it all began, his observations about the stars and night sky began. [1]

=
After college he returned home, and tried to work for the family business, but this was not Percival’s niche. His father wanted him to work at the family run cotton mill, however; this did not hold Percival’s attention for very long. Percival soon left the business world and traveled to the Far East. Percival was going through a hard time in his life, and this was his escape route. He had always been interested in the Far East, but after living there for some time he turned back to his old ways- studying astronomy. Every thing started to change for Lowell around 1893. He was given a book entitled //La Planete Mars by Flammarion. “Whereas the East had beckoned him earlier with its sense of fascinating strangeness, Mars surpassed even Korea and Japan with its extraterrestrial exoticism” (Sheehan and O’Meara 131). Lowell had such strong interests in studying Mars and the idea of life living on another planet. [1] // ======

 Percival Lowell worked with [|William Pickering] and [|Andrew Douglass]. They all were aiming to make further discoveries, but it seemed that Pickering was trying defeat Lowell. Percival set out and eventually built his own observatory. He built his observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona. “At 2,000 meters it was the most elevated of the sites studied and conveniently located on a line of the Atlantic and Pacific railroad” (Sheehan and O’Meara 133). Lowell’s observations about Mars all began when he started using a 46-centimeter telescope. [1,4]

 Is there really life on planet Mars?
 He first noticed a “dark-blue band which [he] regard as a temporary polar sea” (Sheehan and O’Meara 135). When Lowell viewed this again a few months later he noticed a change in coloring. The dark colors were beginning to vanish, and “The whole amount of the blue-green upon it had diminished, and that of the orange ocher had proportionately increased...Mars looked more Martian in November that he had in June” (Sheehan and O’Meara 136). Lowell was eager to find canals on Mars, but he was not able to discover any right away. He kept searching and eventually his logbook read: “Suspected multitudinous canals. Network of canals. General effect quite like Schiaparelli’s globe” (Sheehan and O’Meara 136). [1]



=
This is a map that Percival Lowell constructed in 1905. It depicts the canals on planet Mars (Sheehan and O'Meara 138). [1] =====

 Percival made many observations that support the idea of life existing on Mars. He wrote, “When we put all these facts together...the presence of the spots at junctions of the canals, their apparent invariability [in] size, their seasonal darkening, and last but not least the resemblance of the great equatorial regions of Mars to the deserts of our Earth, one solution instantly suggests itself of their character, to wit: that they are oases in the midst of that desert...Here we have an end and reason for the existence of the canals and the most natural conceivable one- namely that the canals are constructed for the express purpose of fertilizing the oases....And just such inference of design is in keeping with the curiously systematic arrangement of the canals themselves....The whole system is trigonometric to a degree” (Sheehan and O’Meara 137). [1]

 After using the 46 centimeter telescope that The Pennsylvania Flower Observatory let him use for his research, he set off to continue his exploration on planet Mars. Percival was extremely wealthy thus he was able to find himself an even larger telescope that Alvan Graham Clark designed. Lowell helped Clark construct the 61-centimeter refractor by providing financial support for the high tech piece of equipment. [1]

=
 Lowell received a lot of complaints from other astronomers because of his new discovery about planet Venus. He explained that he had seen something different and many opposed his thinking. Lowell was not seeing the “highly reflective clouds”, but rather was seeing “a spider-web structure—radial lines and spokes emanating from a ‘certain center’” (Sheehan and O’Meara 140). His findings seemed to be very controversial thus Lowell did experience hardships such as depression throughout his life. He took time off, but he never did give up his true passion. Lowell found the energy to do what he had loved to do since a youngster- studying space. After Percival had taken some time off, he felt it was necessary to “make his observatory a permanent institution and to tackle the problems of planetary astronomy in a more quantitative manner” (Sheehan and O’Meara 143). He continued to use his telescope to make observations as well as many drawings of what he saw. Lowell continued to notice that change in colors, and he explained this was due to the change in seasons on Mars. Lowell explained that these changes contributed to the development of vegetation on the planet. [1] =====

=
Left Picture: Percival Lowell is using the 61- centimeter refractor to draw artificial planet disks. This occurred in the late 1890s (Sheehan and O'Meara 142). [1] Right Picture: This is a photo of what the 61-centimeter looks like today (Sheehan and O'Meara 141). [1] =====

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;"> Lowell was determined to find the ninth planet after the discovery of Neptune in 1846. He invested much time into this search because he felt “it would improve his reputation as an astronomer” (“Lowell Predicts the Existence of Pluto, August, 1905” para 4). Lowell used very high tech equipment such as the Zeiss Blink Comparator, which “superimposes two photographic plates of the same region for direct comparison” (“Lowell Predicts the Existence of Pluto, August, 1905” para 6). Percival Lowell was unsuccessful, however; he helped another astronomer make the discovery of the ninth planet known as Pluto. Clyde W. Tombaugh used Lowell’s equipment as well as more advanced telescopes that were funded by Percival’s brother Lawrence Lowell. On February 18, 1930 Tombaugh founded Planet X. Although Percival Lowell is not the founder of the planet, he was the individual who started the search for such a celestial object. [4]

**<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Where does the name Pluto come from? **
<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;"> Percival referred to this unknown planet as planet X, however; once it was discovered it was given the name Pluto. A young girl from Oxford, England had learned of the new discovery and came up with the name Pluto (ancient god of the underworld). Although Percival Lowell did not truly find the planet, we are reminded by the symbol PL that he originally started the search for the ninth planet. [5,4]

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Lowell Observatory
<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;"> The land in which the observatory sits on is called “Mars Hill.” It is located in Flagstaff, Arizona. There are other locations in addition to Flagstaff. There is location in Anderson Mesa, which is 12 miles from the [|Lowell Observatory]. The observatory also has a telescope in western Australia at the Perth Observatory. [2,3]

**<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">What is happening at the Lowell Observatory today? **
<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;"> They are working on constructing a 13.8 foot telescope- [|The Discovery Channel Telescope.] The development started in 2008 and is suppose to be finished in 2010. They stated that the advanced piece of equipment would cost 30 million dollars to build due to its fascinating capabilities. It is suppose to be able to observe different celestial objects and areas in our universe such as extrasolar planets, near Earth objects as well matter in the Kuiper belt. [2] <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Today, the observatory provides educational visits as well as tours through Percival Lowell’s great establishment. There is a 31-inch telescope that can be viewed by students who are learning and or researching about astronomical topics. The observatory has made many other discoveries since Percival died in 1916. They continue to use the telescopes and other astronomical equipment to search for new information about our universe. [2]

<span style="color: #800000; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 80%;">This is the dome of the Discovery Channel Telescope. It is not completed yet, but it is expected to be finished in 2011. <span style="color: #800000; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 80%;"> [|http://www.lowell.edu/dct/tour.php?req=sitepics&pic=tour_site_03.jpg]

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;"> Percival Lowell had written several books. Some of them include //<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Memoir on a Trans-Neptunian Planet, //<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Mars as the Abode of Life, //<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">[|Mars and Its Canals], The Evolution of Worlds. ////<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">[4,1] //

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;"> media type="youtube" key="LNXrLUhss-Y" height="385" width="480" <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;"> [|http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LNXrLUhss-Y&feature=related]

**<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;"> Sources Used **
<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; text-align: left;"> 1. Sheehan, William, and Stephen James O’Meara. Mars: The Lure of the Red Planet. New York: Prometheus Books, 2001.

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; text-align: left;"> 2. “Lowell Observatory.” //<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Astronomy & Space: From the Big Bang to the Big Crunch //. Ed. Phillis Engelbert. Online. Detroit: U*X*L, 2007. Science Resource Center. Gale. 14 July 2010 <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; text-align: left;"> []

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; text-align: left;"> 3. Healy, David. “A visit to Mars Hill: home of the expanding universe, the discovery of Pluto, and a cow named Venus, Lowell observatory sustains its rich legacy of discovery.” //<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Astronomy // June 2004: 84. //<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">General OneFile. // Web. 14 July 2010.

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; text-align: left;"> 4. “Lowell Predicts the Existence of Pluto, August, 1905.” <span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">//<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Discovering World History. // Online ed. Detroit: Gale, 2003. //<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Discovering Collection //<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">. Web. 14 July 2010. <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; text-align: left;"> 5. Bond, Bruce. “100 years on Mars hill.” <span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">//<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Astronomy June // 1994: 28+. <span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">//<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">General OneFile //. Web. 14 July 2010.

Type in the content of your page here.