Artificial moons
A body made by people and set circling the earth. Edward Everett Hale imagined one of brick in 1869, to help ships find their longitude.
Signals from the Brick Moon
Edward Everett Hale, “The Brick Moon,” part III, The Atlantic Monthly, December 1869 · December 1869 (the third part of a serial that ran October–December 1869)
Night came. I was “sole alone!” B. M. came, more than filled the field of vision, of course; but for that I was ready. Heavens! how changed. Red no longer, but green as a meadow in the spring. Still I could see — black on the green — the large twenty-foot circles which I remembered so well, which broke the concave of the dome; and, on the upper edge — were these palm-trees? They were. No, they were hemlocks by their shape, and among them were moving to and fro — — — — — flies? Of course, I cannot see flies! But something is moving, — coming, going. One, two, three, ten; there are more than thirty in all! They are men and women and their children!
Could it be possible? It was possible! Orcutt and Brannan and the rest of them had survived that giddy flight through the ether, and were going and coming on the surface of their own little world, bound to it by its own attraction and living by its own laws!
Night came. I was “sole alone!” B. M. came, more than filled the field of vision, of course; but for that I was ready. Heavens! how changed. Red no longer, but green as a meadow in the spring. Still I could see — black on the green — the large twenty-foot circles which I remembered so well, which broke the concave of the dome; and, on the upper edge — were these palm trees? They were. No, they were hemlocks by their shape, and among them were moving to and fro — — — — — flies? Of course, I cannot see flies! But something is moving — coming, going. One, two, three, ten; there are more than thirty in all! They are men and women and their children! Could it be possible? It was possible! Orcutt and Brannan and the rest of them had survived that giddy flight through the ether, and were going and coming on the surface of their own little world, bound to it by its own attraction and living by its own laws!