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Its story

Cygnus spreads its luminous cross across the summer Milky Way, and there glows this yellow-white star — slightly hotter than our Sun but of the same familiar air. Its light took about 146 years to arrive: it set out when Edison was lighting his first electric bulbs and the world's cities were learning, at last, to defy the night. Ironically that same human light would later wash the night sky away from many; but stars like this still arrive, faithful, for those who still raise their eyes.