How did the planet (or asteroid if you prefer) Pluto get its name?

Stew54

There was a newspaper competition and the astronomers liked the name suggested by a schoolgirl. Sorry, don't have a source for this but I expect a Google search will come up with her name (and whether it was the disney dog she had in mind!) Sep 25 03, 6:25 AM

shady shaker

Stew, I don't like to say that you are wrong. Let me just suggest that you are not right!!! Sep 25 03, 6:31 AM

BelperJon

I believe her name was Venetia Burney. The Disney character appeared later. Sep 25 03, 6:32 AM

Stew54

Not wrong Shady, but not very authoritative (you might even say Shaky!) Here is more (also substantiating the girl's name as given by BelperJohn) http://dosxx.colorado.edu/Pluto/Name.html Sep 25 03, 6:39 AM

shady shaker

Thanks guys! According to my information (that means something I've scribbled down that I read somewhere!!) Pluto was first predicted by Percival Lovell, and was named for him. I've just found that source. The 2000 Time Almanac (p.444): "Pluto was predicted by calculation when Percival Lowell (1855-1916) noticed irregularities in the orbits of Uranus and Neptune. Clyde Tombaugh discovered the planet in 1930, precisely where Lowell predicted it would be. THE NAME PLUTO WAS CHOSEN BECAUSE THE FIRST TWO LETTERS REPRESENT THE INITIALS OF PERCIVAL LOWELL". (Caps used for emphasis, not because I'm shouting at you!) Sep 25 03, 6:55 AM

Stew54

It seems that the suggestion of Pluto as the name for the ninth planet, accredited to Miss Burney, may have found favour with the Lowell Observatory partly because of the PL connection. Interestingly some sites suggest that Lowell's calculations were flawed but Tombaugh found the planet by chance because the calculations did nevertheless lead to a search of roughly the right part of the sky. I didn't know there was such a good story to this. Try following some of the links off this page: http://www.seds.org/billa/tnp/pluto.html (I sport a slightly greying moustache myself, BJ!) Sep 25 03, 7:19 AM

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