Waterbury evening Democrat., 1908-06-08
A VISIT TO THE MOON.
Is Such a Thing Within the Bounds
 of Possibility?


 of Possibility?
 Can men visit the moon? In any age but the present, says Professor Ernest Green Dodge. A. M., this question if seriously asked would have been answered by a chorus of jeers. So far beyond the pale of possibilities has the visiting of other worlds always appeared that writ CTS of fiction have felt free to treat the idea sportively, describing thrill ling journeys through space in inn possible vehicles.
 Nevertheless the thought of ex- ploring distant planets, pausing en route to view the farther side of the moon, so tan alizingly turned from us, is one that fires the human im- agination most profoundly. The worst that can be said is that 1t now looks as difficult to us as the cross ing of the great Atlantic must once have appeared to the naked savage upon its shore. The impossibility of the savage became the triumph of Columbus, and the day dream of the nineteenth century may become the achievement even of the twentieth.
 A body ~on the earth's equator is travelling with the earth's rotation at a speed of more than thousand miles an hour. If relieved of grav- ity it would not fly suddenly of, like a cannon ball, and disappear into space. For several seconds its rise from the surface of the earth would be so slow as to be practically inn perceptable owing to the small diff ference between straight tangent line and the earth's slow curvature. Gradually, however, its apparent upward velocity would increase so as to lift 1t some sixty-five yards the first minute and more than a hun dred miles the first hour. It would travel 239,000 miles, the distance between the earth and the moon, in ten days, and if suitably exposed to the earth's attraction, acting as a brake, while screened from that of the moon, its landing could be made gentle and safe. Strangely enough, the unturning attitude of the lunar surface in relation to the earth makes the return voyage ab- solutely impossible save by tedious roundabout journey of many months involving the circumnavigation of Mars.
 The query may now arise, What is the moon good for even if man succeeds in reaching it?"
 We know 1t is a barren rocky world, without air or moisture, un- speakably cold at night and below the freezing point even at noon. However, men could abide there for time in thick walled. airtight houses and could walk out of doors in alright. divers suits. Scientists would find in the lunar wastes a fresh field for exploration. Astron- omers could plant their telescopes there, free from their most serious hindrance, the earth's atmosphere. Tourists of the wealthy and adven- turous class would not fail to visit the, satellite, and costly hotels must be maintained for their accommo- dation. Then it is quite probable that veins of previous metals, beds of diamonds and an abundance of sulphur might be discovered on a world of so highly volanic a char acter.
 The foregoing may seem filled with ";he stuff that dreams are made of," yet most of the assertions are based on the hard facts of math- ematics and physics. History is not always particular to follow the precise path laid out for it by proph- cts, yet in the long run 1t never fails to achieve larger things than the seer dared to predict-New York World.