Astronomy Without a Telescope
- Star Tales - Ursa Minor (ianridpath.com)
The Little Bear was said by the Greeks to have been first named by the astronomer Thales of Miletus, who lived from about 625 to 545 BC. The earliest reference to it seems to have been made by the poet Callimachus of the third century BC, who reported that Thales ‘measured out the little stars of the Wain [wagon] by which the Phoenicians sail’. The little bear was evidently unknown to Homer, two centuries before Thales, for he wrote only of the Great Bear, never mentioning its smaller counterpart.
- Deportation of Kilmar Abrego Garcia (Wikipedia)
Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia is a citizen of El Salvador who was illegally deported from the United States on March 15, 2025, in what the Trump administration called “an administrative error.” He was then imprisoned without trial in the Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT), a maximum security prison in El Salvador, despite never having been charged with or convicted of a crime in either country. His lawyers argue that his imprisonment is part of an agreement to jail U.S. deportees there in exchange for payment, and this was confirmed by United States senator Chris Van Hollen, who had spoken with Félix Ulloa, El Salvador’s vice president. The administration has defended the deportation in the press by accusing him of membership in the MS-13 gang, a U.S.-designated terrorist organization. This accusation was based on a bail determination made in a 2019 immigration court proceedings that Abrego Garcia contested.
- Ursa Minor (Wikipedia)
Ursa Minor (Latin: ‘Lesser Bear’, contrasting with Ursa Major), also known as the Little Bear, is a constellation located in the far northern sky. As with the Great Bear, the tail of the Little Bear may also be seen as the handle of a ladle, hence the North American name, Little Dipper: seven stars with four in its bowl like its partner the Big Dipper. Ursa Minor was one of the 48 constellations listed by the 2nd-century astronomer Ptolemy, and remains one of the 88 modern constellations. Ursa Minor has traditionally been important for navigation, particularly by mariners, because of Polaris being the north pole star.
