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Chronicling America is a searchable digital collection of historic newspaper pages through 1963 sponsored jointly by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Library of Congress.
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Also, see the Directory of U.S. Newspapers in American Libraries, a searchable index to newspapers published in the United States since 1690, which helps researchers identify what titles exist for a specific place and time, and how to access them.
Intelligent vegetables, or tall, Scandinavian-reminiscent super men? The size, shape, and intelligence of Martians was widely speculated by scientists and the public alike during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. After determining that certain colors on Mars revealed water and vegetation and the finding of “canals” on the planet’s surface, the hunt for life on Mars began. Read more about it!
The information in this guide focuses on primary source materials found in the digitized historic newspapers from the digital collection Chronicling America.
The timeline below highlights important dates related to this topic and a section of this guide provides some suggested search strategies for further research in the collection.
| 1870 | Favorable coloring of the planet’s surface lead some scientists to conclude that vegetation exists on Mars. |
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| 1892 | A triangle of lights beaming from Mars causes scientists to think that Mars is signaling to Earth. |
| 1912 | Some scientists speculate that life on Mars might not be physically advanced, but might take the form of highly intelligent vegetables. |
| 1920 | Martians are described as a “super race” and are thought to be more advanced than humans. |
