[mentioned in passing] Scientist who gave a radio lecture that was broadcast on Mars.
Gaines Beecher
Resident agent general for the Mars Company. He tried to stop the colonists' seasonal migration, and plotted with Marquis Howe to send Willis to the London Zoo. After his machinations were revealed, adult Martians "sent him away".
Herbert Beecher
Student at Lowell Academy, son of Gaines Beecher. He was one of the few students who did not live at the school, and who approved of the new regulations (imposed by his father).
Human colony on Mars, named after an ancient Martian city. Located 30 degrees from the south pole, it was occupied only during the southern summer. It was the annual migration from Charax to Copais that the Mars Company's representatives sought to cancel. [Persian, "fort".]
Chen (no other name)
Student at Lowell Academy; son of a terrestrial employed at an outlying station.
Cleary (no first name)
Frank Sutton's Catholic pastor in the Mars colony; he shared a house with the Protestant chaplain.
Human colony on Mars, in the far northern hemisphere, named after an ancient Martian city and occupied only during the northern summer months. It was the annual migration from Charax to Copais that the Mars Company's representatives sought to cancel.
Settlement on the Strymon canal along the route from Charax to Syrtis Major, located near the ancient Martian city of Cynia where the Strymon joins the canal Oeroe. It consisted of merely a lunchroom, a bunkhouse, and a row of prefabricated warehouses.
One of the South Colonists who attended the meeting to discuss the Mars Company's refusal to provide vehicles for the annual migration. He suggested legal action to enforce the right to migrate.
Pekingese dog that Donald MacRae recalled in discussing poetic meanings of names; its family name was "Willis."
Joseph Hartley
Colony hydroponicist. Because his infant daughter was sick and the power had been cut off from the colonists' refuge during their rebellion against the Mars Company, he tried to surrender but was killed as soon as the soldiers saw him. (Mrs. Hartley also appears.)
Relative of the Mars Company's chairman and headmaster of Lowell Academy, who took the position just as Jim Marlowe started school there. He tried to turn the school into a military academy, considering the colonists to be "barbarians" who needed repressive discipline. He tried to steal Willis and sell him to the London Zoo. Willis' recital of a conversation between him and Gaines Beecher revealed the Company's plans to prevent the colonists' semiannual migration to a more tolerable climate.
Dr. Ibañez (no first name)
South Colony psychologist called on to verify Willis' ability to exactly repeat conversations, but not invent them.
a. Boarding student at Lowell Academy. b. South colonist who sided with Jamie Marlowe in his dispute with Kruger over the colonists' right to hold a meeting; he was the father of the Lowell Academy Kelly.
Colonist who suggested attempting to negotiate with Gaines Beecher after the Mars Company refused to allow the colonists to migrate, pointing out that the colonists were numerically superior to Company employees. (Probably Luba Konski's husband.)
Luba Konski
Friend of Jane Marlowe, who gossiped about Sarah Pottle in Willis' presence; Willis later repeated her words when Mrs. Pottle was present.
Site of a pilot plant for extracting oxygen from the iron oxide in Martian sand. (Uncertain whether this is the African nation on Earth, or a Martian locale named after it.)
Linthicum (no first name)
Aggressive colonist who advocated starting a war with the Mars Company.
Boarding school provided for the sons of colonists. It was turned into a military academy by Marquis Howe. Migrating colonists took refuge in the school when their travel was halted by Mars Company representatives.
Physician in the Mars colony, friend of the Marlowes.
James (Jamie) Marlowe, Sr.
Jim Marlowe's father. He led the Mars colonists in defying the Mars Company's attempts to keep them in South Colony during the winter, and became a leader in the revolt against control by Earth.
Mars colonist and student at Lowell Academy who discovered the Mars Company's plans to prevent the colonists' regular migration to more tolerable climates. Because of his friendship with the Martian nymph, Willis, the adult Martians helped him warn the colonists about the Company's plans and to establish the colony's independence from control by Earth companies.
It was colonized by humans governed by an Earth corporation until their revolt, but also inhabited by intelligent natives who were tolerant of the human settlements as long as the humans caused no trouble.
Business enterprise that chartered the colonization of Mars. Its policies showed more concern for profits than for the survival and welfare of the colonists. It was overthrown when it tried to prevent the semiannual migration between the northern and southern hemispheres, which decision probably would have caused the deaths of many colonists from the extreme winter weather.
Marsport
Human city near the Martian equator. It was permanently occupied, mostly by employees of the Mars Company.
Natives were described as averaging 12 or more feet tall, with three legs, three eyes, and arms ending in "palm flaps". An ancient and contemplative race not given to violence, they had the ability to "disappear" anything (or anyone) that attacks them. They apparently remained in contact with the physical world after death. Juvenile Martians were completely unlike adults, resembling furry basketballs that occasionally extruded eyes or limbs, and apparently possessing minimal intelligence.
South Colonist who asked Jamie Marlowe's personal opinion of the migration crisis. She took over Lowell Academy's kitchen when the colonists took refuge there.
Sarah Pottle
The Marlowes' hypochondriac and self-indulgent neighbor. Willis repeated in her presence gossip about her. She protested the charges against Gaines Beecher in the colonists' meeting. She and her husband were killed when they tried to surrender to Mars Company forces after the colonists took refuge in Lowell Academy.
Proclamation of Autonomy
Largely cribbed from the United States Declaration of Independence, it was sent to Chicago to announce the Mars colonists' successful revolt against the Mars Company.
proctor
Employees of the Mars Company commissioned to maintain law and order (and mostly to enforce the Company's authority).
Resident of Syrtis Major, to whom Donald MacRae sent a message about the colonists' situation at Lowell Academy. He was arrested after he and others protested the situation.
Resident Agent General
Official title of the head of the Mars Company operation on Mars.
Student at Lowell Academy who made quite a profit repainting respiratory masks after the headmaster forbade individual designs. Jim Marlowe and Frank Sutton paid him to hide their guns so they would not be confiscated, and sold as much of their property as they could to him to raise money for tickets home when they "escaped" from the school. Smythe joined the colonists in their fight against Mars Company.
Human settlement on Mars, erected just north of the ancient city of Charax, between the legs of the double canal Strymon. It was inhabited only during the Southern Hemisphere's summer, as the winters were intolerable even with special life-support precautions.
Double canal located in the Southern Hemisphere of Mars, near the ancient city of Charax. The name was originally bestowed by Percival Lowell, and was adopted by the human colonists.
Francis (Frank) Sutton
Friend of Jim Marlowe who accompanied him to Lowell Academy. When Willis was confiscated by the headmaster and the two learned about the Mars Company's intentions for the colony, they fled the school and returned home to mobilize the colony to resist.
Area of Mars where Copais was located. (It is unclear whether it was a political or a geographical unit.)
Jan van der Linden
Lowell Academy natural sciences instructor. He was suggested as a successor to Marquis Howe after the Martians "disappeared" Howe.
Willis
Jim Marlowe's Martian "pet": furry and slightly larger than a basketball, with three retractable legs and eyes. It was apparently sentient though simple-minded, and was able to use human speech as well as exactly reproducing any sound it heard including musical compositions and long conversations in the original voices. It was actually the larval form of an adult Martian. His Martian name meant, "In whom the hopes of a world are joined". The human scientific name is Areocephalopsittacus Bron- [The character saying the name is interrupted before completing it; the first part is Greek for "Mars parrot head"; the "Bron-" is probably the first syllable of the discoverer's name.]
