Posted by jburk to Life on Mars at May 26, 2004 11:33 AM

The hunt for water on Mars arguably began in 1877. In that year, Italian astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli spotted what he thought were canali, or channels, on the surface of the Red Planet. An imprecise translation led American astronomer Percival Lowell nearly 30 years later to map "Mars and its canals" – sparking a popular obsession with Martians living in a warm, wet world.