What would you do if you saw a picture of a human face on the ground of another planet? If you were like millions of Americans in the world in 1976 you would automatically assume the worse. That it was some type of communication from aliens or that it was a warning that aliens from Mars were going to come to Earth. In the end these people where wrong and started to commonly be reffered to as conspiracy theorists. The human faces of Mars are really just natural landforms and NASA has been proving that for years.

If you were one of the people told to discover the truth about the faces would you stay calm, or buckle under the pressure? Many people in NASA stayed calm and put together compelling evidence that the landforms were completely natural occurances. In paragraph two of "Unmasking the Face on Mars." it is said that "Scietists figured it was just another Martian mesa, common enough around Cydonia, only this one had unusualy shadows that made it look like an Egyptian Pharaoh." This shows that the landforms were common on the planet, this certain one just had unusual shadows. Nothing to be afraid about, right? For most people no, it wasn't, but some still weren't convinced and one thing to blame was Hollywood.

Have you ever seen the face on mars, maybe in a movie or on a magazine? If the answer to that quoestion is yes then you are like most people around that time. When the face was made public many people and buisnesses jumped on the idea of telling the world made up facts or lies about the face, that it wasn't a natural occurance or that it was a sign from aliens. In paragraph five of the article it says "It has starred in a Hollywood film, appeared in books, magazines, radio talk shows-- even haunted grovery store checkout lines for 25 years! Some people think the Face is bona fide evidence of life on Mars-- evidence that NASA would rather hide..." This proves that people jumped at the idea of going against NASA and telling the world that the Face was something to fear, instead of something to admire.

After another spacecraft was sent to take a picture people still weren't satisfied. In paragraph eight it talks about how the second aircraft that took a picture was stuck behind clouds and people thought the image taken may be distorted in some way. To please the people NASA sent another aircraft to Mars to take yet another picture, but it wasn't easy. In paragraph nine it says "Mission controllers prepared to look again. "It's not easy to target Cydonia," says Garvin... Mars Global Surveyor is a mapping spacecraft that normally looks straight down and scans the planet like a fax machine in a narrow 2.5 km-wide strips. "We just don't pass over the Face very often." This statement proves that NASA would do anything to prove the landform was a natural occurance and when the picture came in, the doubts stopped. In the last paragraph it is stated that "What the picture actually shows is the Martian equivalent of a butte or mesa--landforms common around the American West." This put to rest the crazy theories of alien communication and proved what the face really was, a naturally occuring landform no different than others of its kind.

When you first heard about the face did you believe NASA's explanation or the Hollywood version? If you did believe NASA good job, not many people did, but if you were one of the Hollywood believers that is okay. Hollywood manipulated the face to make it look like something it wasn't and people believed them. In paragraph five it says "The "Face on Mars" has since become a pop icon." This means that you were not alone. The theorists believed Hollywood in what they said about the face. They also thought that since NASA was sending so many aircrafts to get a picture of it, they were just trying to cover up the truth. This is what many people thought for years, but finally the truth came out.

Now the "Face on Mars" is still big in Hollywood, but more to the truthful side. Less and less people believe the conspiracy's thoughts and ideas about the face and started to believe the facts. For years people were in the dark about what the face really was and when it came out people still denied it, but slowly began to warm up to the idea, that the face was a landform, much like the ones here one Earth and maybe people will remember this the next time we find something phenominal on another planet.