Editing Percival Lowell (section)

===Early life and work===

Percival Lowell was born on March 13, 1855,<ref>{{cite news |last1=Eschner |first1=Kat |title=The Bizarre Beliefs of Astronomer Percival Lowell |url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/bizarre-beliefs-astronomer-percival-lowell-180962432/ |access-date=March 12, 2021 |work=Smithsonian Magazine |date=March 13, 2017 |archive-date=December 25, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211225111323/https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/bizarre-beliefs-astronomer-percival-lowell-180962432/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="Agassiz_1917">{{Cite journal |last=Agassiz |first=G.R. |date=1917 |title=Percival Lowell (1855-1916)
 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/20025724.pdf |journal=Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences  |volume=52 |issue=13 |pages=845–847|jstor=20025724 }}</ref><ref name="WDL">{{cite web |url = http://www.wdl.org/en/item/2377/ |title = Chosön, the Land of the Morning Calm; a Sketch of Korea |website = [[World Digital Library]] |date = 1888 |access-date = June 11, 2013 |archive-date = November 12, 2013 |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20131112214341/http://www.wdl.org/en/item/2377/ |url-status = live }}</ref> in [[Boston]], Massachusetts, the first son of [[Augustus Lowell]] and Katherine Bigelow Lowell. A member of the [[Boston Brahmin|Brahmin]] [[Lowell family]], his siblings included the poet [[Amy Lowell]], the educator and legal scholar [[Abbott Lawrence Lowell]], and [[Elizabeth Lowell Putnam]], an early activist for prenatal care. They were the great-grandchildren of [[John Lowell]] and, on their mother's side, the grandchildren of [[Abbott Lawrence]].<ref>[[Delmar R. Lowell|Lowell, Delmar R.]], ''The Historic Genealogy of the Lowells of America from 1639 to 1899'' (Rutland VT: The Tuttle Company, 1899), 283</ref><ref name="WDL"/><ref name="littmann62">{{cite book |ref=Littmann |last=Littmann |first=Mark |title=Planets Beyond: Discovering the Outer Solar System |pages=62–63 |publisher=Courier |date=1985 |isbn=0-486-43602-0}}</ref>

Percival graduated from the [[Noble and Greenough School]] in 1872 and [[Harvard College]] in 1876 with distinction in mathematics.<ref name="littmann62" /> While at Harvard he joined [[Delta Kappa Epsilon]] fraternity.  At his college graduation, he gave a speech, considered very advanced for its time, on the [[nebular hypothesis]]. He was later awarded honorary degrees from [[Amherst College]] and [[Clark University]].<ref>Balik, Rachel (March 13, 2010) [http://www.findingdulcinea.com/features/profiles/l/percival-lowell.html Happy Birthday Percival Lowell, First Man to Imagine Life on Mars] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090315071014/http://www.findingdulcinea.com/features/profiles/l/percival-lowell.html |date=March 15, 2009 }}. findingdulcinea.com</ref> After graduation he ran a [[cotton mill]] for six years.<ref name="WDL"/>
[[File:Ambassador of Joseon to America (black and white).jpg|thumb|The special mission, before departing to the United States. Lowell is seated on the bottom right (1883)]]
In the 1880s, Lowell traveled extensively in the Far East. In August 1883, he served as a foreign secretary and counselor for a [[1883 Korean special mission to the United States|special Korean diplomatic mission to the United States]].<ref>See under [[Empress Myeongseong]] Progressives vs Conservatives</ref> He then went to Korea and lived there from December 1883 to March 1884. In 1884, he took the earliest surviving photograph of a Korean monarch: [[Gojong of Korea|King Gojong]].<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Kwon |first=Heangga |date=2011 |title=King Gojong’s Portrait and the Advent of Photography in Korea |url=https://www.ijkaa.org/v.5/0/58/100 |journal=Journal of Korean Art & Archaeology |language=en |volume=5 |issue=0 |pages=58–69 |doi=10.23158/jkaa.2011.v5_05 |issn=2951-4983}}</ref> He also spent significant periods of time in Japan, writing books on Japanese religion, psychology, and behavior. His texts are filled with observations and academic discussions of various aspects of Japanese life, including language, religious practices, economics, travel in Japan, and the development of personality.

Books by Lowell on the Orient include ''Noto: An Unexplored Corner of Japan'' (1891) and ''Occult Japan, or the Way of the Gods'' (1894), the latter from his third and final trip to the region. His time in Korea inspired ''Chosön: The Land of the Morning Calm''<ref name="WDL"/> (1886, Boston). The most popular of Lowell's books on the Orient, ''The Soul of the Far East'' (1888), contains an early synthesis of some of his ideas that, in essence, postulated that human progress is a function of the qualities of individuality and imagination.{{citation needed|date=June 2013}} The writer [[Lafcadio Hearn]] called it a "colossal, splendid, godlike book."<ref name=Leonard>Leonard, Louise. ''Percival Lowell: An Afterglow''. RG Badger, 1921, pp. 33, 46.</ref> At his death he left with his assistant [[Wrexie Leonard]] an unpublished manuscript of a book entitled ''Peaks and Plateaux in the Effect on Tree Life''.<ref name=Leonard/>

Lowell was elected a Fellow of the [[American Academy of Arts and Sciences]] in 1892.<ref name=AAAS>{{cite web|title=Book of Members, 1780–2019: Chapter L|url=https://www.amacad.org/sites/default/files/media/document/2019-10/ChapterL.pdf|publisher=American Academy of Arts and Sciences|access-date=March 12, 2021|archive-date=May 19, 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240519221129/https://www.amacad.org/sites/default/files/media/document/2019-10/ChapterL.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref> He moved back to the United States in 1893.<ref name="WDL"/> He became determined to study Mars and astronomy as a full-time career after reading [[Camille Flammarion]]'s ''La planète Mars''.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/lifeonmarscomple00cham|title=Life on Mars; The Complete Story|last=Chambers|first=P.|date=1999|publisher=Blandford|isbn=0-7137-2747-0|place=London}}</ref> He was particularly interested in the [[Martian canals|canals of Mars]], as drawn by Italian astronomer [[Giovanni Schiaparelli]], who was director of the Milan Observatory. The Boston geologist George Russel Agassiz noted that Lowell made the decision to begin his observations after hearing that Schiaparelli began to experience failing eyesight.<ref name=":0">{{Cite book |last=Schorn |first=Ronald A. |title=Planetary astronomy: from ancient times to the third millennium |date=1998 |publisher=Texas A & M University Press |isbn=0-585-38034-1 |location=College Station, TX |oclc=49414656}}</ref> Beginning in the winter of 1893–94, using his wealth and influence, Lowell dedicated himself to the study of astronomy, founding the observatory which bears his name.<ref name="littmann62"/> He chose [[Flagstaff, Arizona|Flagstaff, Arizona Territory]], as the home of his new observatory. At an altitude of over {{convert|2100|m|ft|abbr=off|sp=us}}, with few cloudy nights, and far from city lights, Flagstaff was an excellent site for astronomical observations. This marked the first time an observatory had been deliberately located in a remote, elevated place for optimal seeing which included enhanced image quality, sharpness and steadiness.<ref name=":0" /><ref name="littmann62" /> At his Flagstaff observatory Lowell favored the use of smaller telescopes rather than larger ones, believing that they were usually better for viewing fine planetary details.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Hoyt |first=William Graves |title=Lowell and Mars |date=1976 |publisher=University of Arizona Press |isbn=0-8165-0435-0 |location=Tucson |oclc=2390580}}</ref> He was assisted in setting up his observatory by William Pickering, another observer of Mars who had noted the lines seen by Schiaparelli as well.<ref>{{cite journal | doi=10.1177/002182869302400104 | title=William H. Pickering in Jamaica: The Founding of Woodlawn and Studies of Mars | year=1993 | last1=Plotkin | first1=Howard | journal=Journal for the History of Astronomy | volume=24 | issue=1–2 | pages=101–122 | bibcode=1993JHA....24..101P | s2cid=117637626 }}</ref>

Lowell was elected to the [[American Philosophical Society]] in 1897.<ref>{{Cite web |title=APS Member History |url=https://search.amphilsoc.org/memhist/search?creator=Percival+Lowell&title=&subject=&subdiv=&mem=&year=&year-max=&dead=&keyword=&smode=advanced |access-date=2024-03-01 |website=search.amphilsoc.org |archive-date=March 1, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240301144357/https://search.amphilsoc.org/memhist/search?creator=Percival+Lowell&title=&subject=&subdiv=&mem=&year=&year-max=&dead=&keyword=&smode=advanced |url-status=live }}</ref>

In 1904, Lowell received the [[Prix Jules Janssen]], the highest award of the [[Société astronomique de France]], the French astronomical society. For the last 23 years of his life, astronomy, Lowell Observatory, and his and others' work at his observatory were the focal points of his life.

[[World War I]] very much saddened Lowell, a dedicated pacifist. This, along with some setbacks in his astronomical work (described below), undermined his health and contributed to his death from a stroke on November 12, 1916, aged 61.<ref>Croswell, Kenneth (1997) ''Planet Quest: The Epic Discovery of Alien Solar Systems''. p. 49. {{ISBN|0684832526}}.</ref> Lowell is buried on Mars Hill near his observatory.<ref name="McKim_1995">{{Cite journal |last=McKim |first=R. |date=1995 |title=Astronomy on Mars Hill |url=http://adsabs.harvard.edu/pdf/1995JBAA..105...69M |journal=Journal of the British Astronomical Society |volume=105 |pages=69–74 |access-date=March 12, 2021 |archive-date=May 23, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220523101504/https://adsabs.harvard.edu/pdf/1995JBAA..105...69M |url-status=live }}</ref> Lowell claimed to "stick to the church" though at least one current author describes him as an agnostic.<ref>{{cite book|title=Percival Lowell: The Culture and Science of a Boston Brahmin|last=Strauss|first=David|date=2001|publisher=Harvard University Press|isbn=9780674002913|page=280|quote=Though Lowell claimed to 'stick to the church' (doubtless from my early religious training), he was an agnostic and hostile to Christianity.}}</ref>