Pluto Discovered by Clyde Tombaugh

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FEBRUARY 18, 1930

Flagstaff, Arizona, United States (Lowell Observatory)
96 years ago

On February 18, 1930, Clyde W. Tombaugh, a 24-year-old American with no formal training in astronomy, made one of the 20th century’s most famous discoveries: Pluto, found at the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona.

Tombaugh’s job was painstaking: photograph the same star fields repeatedly using Lowell’s 13-inch (33 cm) astrograph, then hunt for any object that “moved” against the fixed background of stars.

The discovery wasn’t a lucky glance—it was earned by method.

Tombaugh compared images using a blink comparator, a device that rapidly alternates between two photographic plates so any moving object appears to “jump.”

The plates that revealed Pluto were taken on January 23 and January 29, 1930, and the find was later publicly announced in March 1930.

In that era, Pluto was celebrated as a new “ninth planet,” the long-sought “Planet X” many believed should exist beyond Neptune, though later discoveries would show the outer solar system was far richer (and stranger) than anyone suspected in 1930.

—— WHY THIS MATTERS ——

Pluto’s discovery matters because it’s a perfect example of how big breakthroughs often happen:

• Patient systems beat genius flashes. Tombaugh’s edge was disciplined, repetitive comparison work.

• Tools shape discovery. The 13-inch astrograph and blink comparator turned “searching the sky” into a scalable method.

• One dot can rewrite a map. Pluto helped open the story of what we now call the Kuiper Belt region, an outer solar system filled with icy worlds.

—— THE TAKEAWAY ——

On February 18, 1930, a 24-year-old observer found a moving speck that changed our sense of the solar system’s edge, and proved that discovery often rewards the people willing to do the slow work longer than anyone else.

At Masters of Trivia, with our MOT utility token, we turn turning points like this into daily interactive learning, so curiosity becomes a habit, and history becomes something you can use.

How much do you know about Pluto’s discovery—Tombaugh, Lowell Observatory, the blink comparator, and why the hunt for “Planet X” mattered?

Take today’s quiz and test your knowledge of the tiny world that made the solar system feel bigger overnight.