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- DISCOVERY OF PLUTO: 1930
-
- The ninth (and final?) planet of the solar system
- was discovered in 1930 by American astronomer Clyde
- William Tombaugh, ending a 25 year telescopic search
- initiated by another American astronomer, Percival
- Lowell. Lowell first predicted the existence of the
- planet in 1905 in order to account for perturbations
- in the orbit of Uranus.
- Only visible through powerful telescopes, the
- yellowish Pluto orbits the sun once every 248 years.
- Pluto's discovery (like that of Uranus and Neptune
- before it) sent astrologers scrambling to determine
- what significance the planet has in creating
- astrological horoscopes.
- In Greek-Roman mythology, Pluto was the god of the
- underworld and the dead, the son of Saturn, and the
- brother of Jupiter (king of the gods) and Neptune
- (god of the sea).
-