Percival Lowell Percival Lowell Percival Lawrence Lowell (; March 13, 1855 – November 12, 1916) was an American businessman, author, mathematician, and astronomer who fueled speculation that there were canals on Mars. He founded the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona and formed the beginning of the effort that led to the discovery of Pluto 14 years after his death. Percival Lowell was born on March 13, 1855, in Boston, Massachusetts, the first son of Augustus Lowell and Katherine Bigelow Lowell. A member of the Brahmin Lowell family, his siblings included the poet Amy Lowell, the educator and legal scholar Abbott Lawrence Lowell,
Lowell (Martian crater) then started observing Mars intensively for years. He used the observatory and his large refractor telescope to discover over 500 canals on Mars. Lowell promoted the idea that they were constructed by an intelligent race of Martians. However, when pictures were received from spacecraft, the canals were found to be optical illusions. Nevertheless, much of the later interest in Mars exploration resulted from the efforts of Lowell. Lowell (Martian crater) The Lowell Crater is a large impact crater on Aonia Terra in the Thaumasia quadrangle of Mars. The crater is about 203 kilometers (127 miles) in diameter. Lowell Crater has