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Identifying An Old Kids' Book |
 Feb 17 2006, 02:32 AM
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#1
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Member  Group: Members Posts: 509 Joined: 2-July 05 From: Calgary, Alberta Member No.: 426  |
There weren't many astronomy books in my hometown's local public library, and, as a result, I often ended up re-reading books I had already read several times just because they were the only ones available. I've been trying to identify one particular favorite for a few years now, but haven't been able to place it.
About the only thing I can unambiguously identify with this book is the last chapter, a macabre little piece with a title along the lines of "The Death Of The Solar System". The last couple of sentences were -- and I think this is nearly verbatim -- "The Solar System now consists of five dead planets circling a frozen cinder. Final curtain". This of course refers to the inner planets having been swallowed up by the Sun during its red giant phase. The last page also included a kids'-type drawing of the Sun, but drawn mostly in black, and with a sad, eyes-downcast face instead of the usual smiling one. Melodramatic, but the sort of melodrama that sticks in your mind when you're a kid. I think it also featured several Bonestell-like paintings of the fission origin of the Moon, complete with a description of the "Pacific Ocean basin" theory (this could perhaps date the book) and also a red, Mars-like planet being tidally disrupted by Jupiter (thus creating the asteroid belt). However, these last few might have been from other books -- these memories are twenty-five-year-old, and it wouldn't be surprising if I'm confusing this particular book with a couple of others. It was a fairly large (outsized) book, so I'm pretty sure it wasn't one of Franklin Branley's. Anyone remember it? |
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Feb 17 2006, 03:46 PM
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 Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2454 Joined: 8-July 05 From: NGC 5907 Member No.: 430 |
These Web sites are a good place to start:
http://sun3.lib.uci.edu/~jsisson/john.htm http://www.alexaart.com/Books1.html -------------------- "After having some business dealings with men, I am occasionally chagrined,
and feel as if I had done some wrong, and it is hard to forget the ugly circumstance. I see that such intercourse long continued would make one thoroughly prosaic, hard, and coarse. But the longest intercourse with Nature, though in her rudest moods, does not thus harden and make coarse. A hard, sensible man whom we liken to a rock is indeed much harder than a rock. From hard, coarse, insensible men with whom I have no sympathy, I go to commune with the rocks, whose hearts are comparatively soft." - Henry David Thoreau, November 15, 1853 |
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Feb 19 2006, 04:43 PM
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#3
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Member Group: Members Posts: 509 Joined: 2-July 05 From: Calgary, Alberta Member No.: 426 |
I actually have checked out those sites (thanks anyways for the suggestion). I thought that one of Willy Ley's old books might have been the one, but it's difficult to tell just from the cover art.
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| Guest_PhilCo126_* |
Feb 19 2006, 04:44 PM
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#4
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