SURFACE BRIGHTNESS DISTANCE DETERMINATIONS TO THE LARGE MAGELLANIC CLOUD CEPHEID VARIABLES HV-899 AND HV-2257

We present new VRI light curves for the long-period LMC Cepheids HV899 and 2257 and combine these data with the CORAVEL radial velocity curv es of Imbert to derive the distances to these variables using the surf ace brightness method. Assuming metallicities of [Fe/H]=(-0.4 +/- 0.2) for both supergiants, we find metallicity-corrected distances of (65. 2 +/- 4.3) kpc for HV899 and (65.7 +/- 4.3) kpc for HV2257, which corr espond to true distance moduli of (19.07 +/- 0.15) and (19.09 +/- 0.15 ) mag, respectively. These distance moduli are about 0.4 mag larger th an those predicted for the LMC by the galactic Cepheid calibration of the surface brightness method of Gieren, Barnes & Moffett [which predi cts mu0(LMC) approximately 18.65 mag]. While very low metallicities fo r the Cepheids ([Fe/H]less than or similar to -1.0) might explain this discrepancy, the present results provide evidence of a large distance modulus for the LMC of near 19.0.