Luna Park

There may be life of a sort on the moon, after all, despite its admitted lack of atmosphere. Fifty-five plats or fields of something which can best be described as "vegetation" have been observed and mapped on the southern wall of the great moon crater Eratosthenes, by Dr. William H. Pickering, the Harvard astronomer, at the Mandeville (Jamaica) Observatory.

Dr. Pickering concentrated on an area of 1,073 square miles (one third the size of Yellowstone Park), and photographed and sketched it continuously while that part of the moon was visible. The "vegetation" resembles nothing known upon the earth, for it would have to be able to withstand a heat of 200 degrees Fahrenheit for part of the month, and for several days during the lunar night a cold more severe than any known on earth. The strips of color that look like vegetation rise and grow for 8 to 10 days during the moon's daytime. Sometimes they seem to move across the surface at a rate of 60 feet an hour. They are not shadows, and must be either mineral discolorations on the surface, or something moving of a vegetable or animal nature. The lunar "vegetation" is somewhat similar to that in the "canals" of Mars.

The Eratosthenes region is an oasis, separated from other similar areas by enormous desert tracts. Some astronomers think that the great craters may emit steam which provides a sort of atmosphere.