I just googled "oldest star" and got a great hit: The oldest star in our galaxy (the Milky Way) is designated HE0107-5240. It is in the direction of a southern constellation, Phoenix, and is about 36,000 light years away -- that means the light from this star takes 36,000 years to reach us. You can read more about it at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/h...e/nature/2381935.stm

The Milky Way - our galaxy - has many, many, many stars! Scientists estimate it contains about 100 billion (100,000,000,000). If you go up in the mountains away from the light pollution of cities, you can see a few thousand stars with the naked eye. You can also see the dust because it obscures some stars. There a nice picture at http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap990224.html and another nice picture in infrared light at http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/milky_way.html. Paulett