By Laura Reiley<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s unassuming, just a black stone slab flush against the withered late-fall grass: CARL EDWARD SAGAN, November 9, 1934\u2013December 20, 1996. But, like all the celestial bodies in the wide sky above, the square has its own gravitational pull.<\/p>\n\n\n\n People come from all over the blue marble of planet Earth, pilgrims to the graveside of America\u2019s most famous astronomer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n They leave gifts. Coins and tiny plastic astronauts, a Magic 8 Ball, and so many heartfelt letters.<\/p>\n\n\n Sagan would have turned 90 on November 9, 2024\u2014a birthday that will be celebrated with suitable fanfare at Cornell\u2019s Carl Sagan Institute<\/a> and elsewhere on campus, in Ithaca and beyond. But the letters, many of them waffled by rain and barely legible, pay a different, more personal tribute.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt\u2019s a wonderful world out there! Thanks as always for helping protect it for me and everyone,\u201d one reads.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cYour example gave me hope that I could pursue both my biggest interests, that I wouldn\u2019t have to choose between creative writing and science,\u201d another letter says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Your example gave me hope that I could pursue both my biggest interests, that I wouldn\u2019t have to choose between creative writing and science.<\/p>\nA letter on Sagan’s grave<\/strong><\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n \u201cFor small creatures such as we the vastness is bearable only through love,\u201d a small, white note says. <\/p>\n\n\n\n A gifted educator who made science accessible to the public via dozens of books and the long-running PBS documentary series \u201cCosmos: A Personal Voyage,\u201d Sagan continues to draw people together through his work. By contextualizing the immensity of space, he made us feel connected in our own infinitesimal part of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cHe helped launch the space age by popularizing space; his legacy has touched so many people,\u201d says Gerry Monaghan, an unofficial tender of Sagan\u2019s grave\u2014and those of Sagan\u2019s parents, buried alongside him\u2014at Ithaca\u2019s Lake View Cemetery.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThere seems to be a very interesting assortment of characters who also visit regularly and leave an array of curious objects.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Blue marbles are common, a reference to the photo \u201cThe Blue Marble,\u201d taken of Earth on December 7, 1972, by the astronauts aboard Apollo 17<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s an iconic image and symbol of the environmental movement, echoed by a photo taken of Earth by Voyager 1<\/em> on February 14, 1990\u2014a photo Sagan and his wife, Ann Druyan, urged NASA to take and which they named \u201cPale Blue Dot<\/a>,\u201d an urgent reminder of our true circumstances in the cosmos, Druyan says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It is these circumstances, in part, that draw people to this gentle hill in Lake View Cemetery.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cMany visitors may be coming from outside of Ithaca, making a sort of pilgrimage, so it feels like the right thing to do to leave something there,\u201d says Gillis Lowry \u201924, a research assistant for Lisa Kaltenegger<\/a>, associate professor of astronomy and director of the Carl Sagan Institute in Arts & Sciences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Many visitors may be coming from outside of Ithaca, making a sort of pilgrimage, so it feels like the right thing to do to leave something there.<\/p>\nGillis Lowry \u201924<\/strong><\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Lowry shares a birthday with Sagan and has felt a connection to him since she was a little girl.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cFor me, the long journey I took was from my home in St. Louis to Ithaca for my college visit to Cornell, and I was getting to see locations connected to Carl Sagan,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAt the grave I wrote a letter about all the ways he\u2019s helped me in my life. I wrote, \u2018Of course, you\u2019re never going to read this, it will just get swept away in a few days and it feels a little silly to leave it here.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2024\/11\/IMG_2634-A-1024x576.jpg\")
\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2024\/11\/IMG_2633-A-1024x577.jpg\")
\n
![\"a](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2024\/11\/2024_1446_SH_003-A.jpg\")
<\/figure>![\"coins,](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2024\/11\/2024_1446_SH_004-A.jpg\")
<\/figure>![\"a](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2024\/11\/2024_1446_SH_002-A.jpg\")
<\/figure>![\"A](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2024\/11\/2024_1446_SH_009-A.jpg\")
<\/figure><\/div>