Jan 22 1979
From The Space Library
The Washington Post reported that Pluto, known for some 40 years as the outermost planet of the Earth's solar system, would no longer be furthest from the Sun as of this date, when it would edge inside the orbit of Neptune and remain there until March 1999. Discovered in 1930 by Clyde Tombaugh at the Lowell Observatory, Pluto had an elliptical orbit that would bring it inside that of Neptune every 248 years (that is, the crossing last happened in 1731, and before that in 1483) and keep it there for about 20 years.
Scientists at the U.S. Naval Observatory said that elliptical orbits of the two planets were so inclined that Pluto and Neptune could never come closer than about 240 million miles to one another. Last year, photographs of Pluto revealed a large satellite visible from only one side of the planet; it was named Charon, for the ferryman on the river Styx in Pluto's realm of Hades. (Washington Post, Jan 22/79, A-9)
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