TV Corvi: The Personal Story of the Discovery of a High Galactic Latitude Cataclysmic Variable

Abstract

Clyde Tombaugh, discoverer of Pluto and a lifelong AAVSO friend, lived in Las Cruces fort he last 50 years of his life ; his family still lives here During his search for trans-Saturnian planets he discovered what he thought was a nova in outburst March 23, 1931. Although he reported it to his superior at the time, news of the discovery remained buried in the plate archive at Lowell Observatory until I found it while doing research for his biography. A seach of the plate archives at Harvard subsequently revealed 9 other outbursts of what was apparently a cataclysmic variable of high galactic latitude. Now named TV Corvi, the star was first visually observed in outburst on March 23, 1990