The far side of the moon
For hundreds of years, ever since people have known that the moon was
like a planet, they have wondered about something. They have wondered
what the far side of the moon was like.
You see, even though the moon spins around, we never get to see all of
it. The tug of earth’s gravity causes the moon to spin very slowly. In
fact, the moon only spins around once in the time it takes to go all the
way around the earth. As a result, the same side of the moon always
faces the earth. The diagram on the opposite page shows how this
happens.
People wondered what the moon’s far side was like. Was it bare and
rocky, like the side we can see? Or was it different? Was it possible
that there might be water, plants, and animals living on the side we
cannot see?
We don’t have to wonder anymore. In 1959, a Soviet spaceship went around
the moon. There was no one on this ship, but there were cameras that
took pictures of the moon’s far side. Later, other Soviet and American
spaceships, some with people in them, took more pictures. The pictures
showed that the far side of the moon is just as bare and rocky as the
side we see.
So, we now know something that all the billions of people who lived
before us didn’t know. We know what the far side of the moon looks like.
the far side of the moon
This diagram shows why we can never see the moon’s far side. Even though
the moon makes one full turn as it goes around the earth, its far side
(shown by the flag) is never turned toward us.
