17 Sep,1789: Saturn’s ‘Death Star’ moon Mimas was discovered

Science: On September 17, 1789, British astronomer William Herschel discovered Saturn’s Death Star moon Mimas. Of course, Star Wars didn’t exist back then, and no one had ever heard of something called the Death Star. But there’s no denying that this moon looks just like it.

Anyway, Herschel was a guy who loved making telescopes and discovering tiny moons around the planets Uranus, Jupiter and Saturn, and other objects in space. Soon after inventing a giant new type of reflecting telescope called the Herschel telescope, he spotted Mimas orbiting Saturn. Mimas is very small, less than 250 miles in diameter. It’s the smallest known spherical body in space, held together by its own gravity.