The Greatest Astronomical Discovery of All Time

     August of 1935 was a banner time for the scientific community.  One Sir John Herschel, L.L.D. F.R.S. & c, changed the face of Science, and it’s perception of the sky and beyond… forever.  Or at least for a week or two.

     The entire headline in the New York Post read “Great Atronomical Discoveries Lately Made By Sir John Herschel, L.L.D.  F.R.S. &c.   At the Cape of Good Hope [From Supplement to the Edinburgh Journal of Science]“.  It told of the great leaps made by Herschel, a British astronomer, in the design of the telescope.   This new design opened the skies as they had never been.  New planets in other solar systems and comets universe wide were discovered, and numerous mathematical astronomic thoeries had either been proved or disproved .  He was single handedly changing the Science of Astronomy.

     But his greatest discoveries had been made right in our back yard; our moon.  With his massive new telescope, he had been able to view, in detail, the lunar surface.  Finally, the mysteries of our neighbor were laid bare… her landscapes revealed!  And such majestic landscapes they were!  Huge forests and seas…  Quartz pyramids im magical shades of purple;  rolling plains teaming with wildlife… and such wildlife!  Nearly infinate herds of Bison roaming the plains… blue unicorns perched upon the hills.  And the genuine find; not one but two intelligent races, co-existing!

     Vespertilio-homo, a breed of winged men,  and a tribe of two legged upright beavers.  Civilized, albeit apparently very primal.

     You knew immediately this was fantasy.  Not that the New York Post published the series… it did.  But you are probably aware there are no purple unicorns on the moon.  But in this, a different era… an era where we were just gaining our scientific legs, the boundaries weren’t limited by knowledge, but by the reaches of imagination.  Scholars even from Yale sang the praises of these earth shattering discoveries.  It was, in many ways, a hoax on a par with any in history.  For a time, the entire world bit.

      As silly as it seems in retrospect, I am… envious.  We have seen it all already.  Some, in part, due to technology.  Not just the discoveries that we have made, but that the fact that in today’s world, most mysteries die quickly.  What the internet doesn’t devour, we overdramatize, overanalyze, and overdose on.  If it isn’t dead in three days, we wish it was.  Wouldn’t it be nice, just once, to be in awe of something on television that wasn’t blowing up or bleeding?  To feel that childlike sense of awe over something?  If they found a T-Rex in the jungles of Africa, we would be unimpressed.  (Thanks, Spielberg)  Find the Loch Ness Monster?  Keep us entertained until the American Idol highlights came on. 

     We live in a world devoid of magic, because what we once percieved as magic… even 20 years ago… is now our everyday reality.  These people may seem like buffoons to us, but I almost think they were the lucky ones.  When was the last time your magic didn’t come from dreamworks?  Wouldn’t it be nice, just for a bit, to live in a world where unicorns might live on the moon?