PEOPLE IN AMERICA -February 10, 2002: Percival Lowell
By Mario Ritter
VOICE ONE:
I’m Mary Tillotson.
VOICE TWO:
And I’m Bob Doughty with the VOA Special English program People in America. Today, we tell about
Percival Lowell whose work led to the discovery of the planet Pluto. His efforts and imagination helped change
the history of astronomy in America.
((THEME)
)
VOICE ONE:
Percival Lowell came from a New England family with a long history in America. The Lowell family first came
to the colony of Massachussetts in Sixteen-Thirty-Nine. One of Percival Lowell’s ancestors, John Cabot
Lowell, manufactured cloth. He became an important American industrialist in the late Eighteenth and early
Nineteenth Centuries.
Percival’s father, Augustus Lowell, worked in the family cloth business. He settled his
family in Boston, Massachusetts. Percival was born there in Eighteen-Fifty-Five. He had a
younger brother, Abbott Lawrence and a younger sister, Amy.
VOICE TWO:
Percival Lowell attended American and European private schools as a young man. He studied
mathematics at Harvard University. After he finished his studies at Harvard in Eighteen-
Seventy-Six, he traveled in Europe and the Middle East for a year. Then he worked as a
financial officer in the cloth business of his grandfather. After several years, Percival realized he was not happy
as a businessman. So he decided to travel to Japan to study its culture and language. While there, he was asked to
go with a special trade group from Korea to establish trade relations with the United States.
In Eighteen-Eighty -Three, Mister Lowell traveled to Korea as a diplomat. He reported on a clash there between
Korean and Japanese troops. Mister Lowell remained in East Asia for ten years. He returned home when each of
his six books about East Asian subjects was published.
((MUSIC BRIDGE))
VOICE ONE:
Percival Lowell also had an intense interest in astronomy and mathematics. In Eighteen-Ninety-Three he left
Tokyo for the last time and returned to the United States. He decided to spend more time observing the planet
Mars. He had studied observations by the famous Italian astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli. He found notes that
described markings on Mars that Mister Schiaparelli called “canali”
(can-AL-ee). Mister Lowell came to
believe that intelligent life created the markings on Mars.
In Eighteen-Ninety Four, he built an observatory near Flagstaff, Arizona. He had the world -famous telescope-
maker Alvan Clark and Sons make a telescope for his observatory. He began a program of observing not only
Mars, but also Venus and Mercury.
VOICE TWO:
Mister Lowell published his first book about Mars in Eighteen-Ninety-Five. In it, he developed a theory that
intelligent life had created waterways all over the surface of Mars. His theory was that Martians were trying to
bring water to the warm areas near the equator of the planet.
Mister Lowell’s theories were based on what were serious scientific studies of that time. Yet his theories about
life on Mars may have had more lasting influence on many writers of imaginary stories. Three years after Mister
Lowell’s book was published, H-G Wells published his famous book “War of the Worlds.
”
Mister Wells’
story told of a Martian invasion of Earth. The Martians that he imagined lived on a dry and wasted planet. This is
very similar to Mister Lowell’s description of Mars.
Mister Lowell’s theories about Mars also influenced Edgar Rice Burroughs. Mister Burroughs is best known for
stories about “Tarzan.
”
He also wrote a series of books about an American who traveled to Mars and fell in
love with a beautiful princess. The popular series began in Nineteen Twelve with “The Princess of Mars.
”
VOICE ONE:
Mister Lowell’s book, “Mars and Its Canals,
”
was published in Nineteen-Oh -Six. In that book, he expanded
his theory about Martian life. He said he could see changes in the seasons on the surface of Mars. He said the
darkening of the Martian surface during some times of the year was caused by the growth of plants. His theory of
Martian life became so complex that he made maps of cities and waterways on the planet.
Percival Lowell did not know that his eyes played a part in the markings he saw on Mars. Experts explain that the
movement of air in the atmosphere and natural qualities of the human eye caused him to see markings that were
not there.
VOICE TWO:
Percival Lowell also studied the effect of gravity on the planet Neptune. Small changes in the movement of
Neptune led several astronomers to believe that an undiscovered planet was affecting Neptune ’s orbit. Mister
Lowell called it Planet X.
Mister Lowell himself searched for Planet X for two years starting in Nineteen-Oh -Five. He made the search by
comparing two pictures of the same part of the sky. The photographs would be taken several weeks apart. The
astronomer would then check both photographs. An object in the solar system could be identified if it appeared to
move from its place in the earlier photograph.
However, the first search failed. In fact, he failed to recognize Planet X in a few photographs. He searched again
for it several years later. Percival Lowell did not have the chance to discover Planet X. He died suddenly in
November, Nineteen-Sixteen.
((MUSIC BRIDGE))
VOICE ONE:
The search for Planet X did not restart at Lowell Observatory for years. Then in Nineteen-Twenty-Five, Guy
Lowell a relative of Percival, gained control of the observatory. He decided to seriously search for Planet X. He
wanted to continue the work Percival had started.
In the following years, Percival’s brother, Abbott Lawrence, provided money to build a special photographic
telescope. The new telescope was completed in early Nineteen -Twenty-Nine.
That year, an observatory official, V-M Slipher, offered a young man a job working with the new telescope. The
young man ’s name was Clyde Tombaugh (TOM-baw).
VOICE TWO
Mister Tombaugh got a job a Lowell Observatory after he sent drawings of his observations of Jupiter and Mars.
He quickly learned how best to use the new photographic telescope at the observatory. He carefully planned his
research to make the most of his time. On February Eighteenth, Nineteen-Thirty, he discovered an unusual object
after less than one year of searching. The object moved slowly in the sky like a distant planet. Percival Lowell ’s
Planet X had been found!
On March thirteenth, Clyde Tombaugh and V-M Slipher announced the discovery of a new planet. The date was
the seventy-fifth anniversary of Mister Lowell’s birth.
Mister Tombaugh continued to record the motion of the new planet for thirteen years. He found more than seven-
hundred small bodies that orbit the sun, called asteroids. He also discovered a number of star systems called
galaxies.
((MUSIC BRIDGE))
VOICE ONE:
During his life, Percival Lowell did not enjoy the success he hoped to find in astronomy. He died long before the
search for Planet X resulted in the discovery of Pluto. And his theories about waterways and complex life on
Mars have been disproved. In Nineteen-Sixty-Five, NASA’s Mariner Four spacecraft showed that no
waterways existed on Mars.
Yet, the institution Mister Lowell established in Flagstaff, Arizona, has made many
discoveries in addition to that of Pluto. Evidence that the universe is expanding was
first discovered at Lowell Observatory by V-M Slipher. Also, the rings around the
planet Uranus were discovered there.
Lowell Observatory now has four telescopes and is continuing to expand. It supports
programs that bring astronomy to the public.
Astronomers at Lowell and many other observatories continue to search for life
beyond our planet. Their efforts continue Percival Lowell’s tradition of scientific
investigation.
((THEME))
VOICE TWO:
This Special English program was written by Mario Ritter. It was produced by Caty Weaver. I’m Bob Doughty.
VOICE ONE:
And I’m Mary Tillotson. Join us again next week for another PEOPLE IN AMERICA program on the Voice of
America.
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