Clyde Tombaugh
When Clyde Tombaugh entered the University of Kansas in 1932, he tried to register for freshman astronomy. The professor in charge of the course refused to enroll him. He thought Tombaugh's presence in the class would be inappropriate, since Tombaugh had already achieved something only a handful of astronomers have ever done. As a 24-year-old research assistant at the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona, without the benefit of any formal training in astronomy, Tombaugh had discovered a new planet: Pluto. Clyde Tombaugh's interest in astronomy began when he was a young boy, growing up on a farm in the Middle West, without access to observatories, universities or even a large library. Unable to afford a college education, Tombaugh taught himself solid geometry and trigonometry, and studied the stars through telescopes he built himself. After his 1930 discovery of Pluto won him world renown, Tombaugh at last acquired the college education he had long desired. He resumed astronomical