Space Travel: A History : An Update of History of Rocketry & Space Travel

by Wernher von Braun, Frederick Ira Ordway III

Wernher Von Braun, Frederick I., III Ordway, Fred Du Harpercollins space, history, travel, update, rocketry 308 1985-11 English Aeronautics & Astronautics, Astronomy & Space Science, Science & Math, 0061818984 9780061818981 Hardcover (4 Sub)

Genres: History, Space

308 pages, Hardcover

First published November 1, 1985

About the author

Wernher Magnus Maximilian, Freiherr von Braun (March 23, 1912 – June 16, 1977) was a German rocket scientist, aerospace engineer, space architect, and one of the leading figures in the development of rocket technology in Nazi Germany during World War II and in the United States after that.

A former member of the Nazi party, commissioned Sturmbannführer of the paramilitary SS and decorated Nazi war hero, von Braun would later be regarded as the preeminent rocket engineer of the 20th century in his role with the United States civilian space agency NASA. In his 20s and early 30s, von Braun was the central figure in Germany's rocket development program, responsible for the design and realization of the deadly V-2 combat rocket during World War II. After the war, he and some of his rocket team were taken to the U.S. as part of the then-secret Operation Paperclip. Von Braun worked on the US Army intermediate range ballistic missile (IRBM) program before his group was assimilated by NASA, under which he served as director of the newly-formed Marshall Space Flight Center and as the chief architect of the Saturn V launch vehicle, the superbooster that propelled the Apollo spacecraft to the Moon. According to one NASA source, he is "without doubt, the greatest rocket scientist in history. His crowning achievement was to lead the development of the Saturn V booster rocket that helped land the first men on the Moon in July 1969." In 1975 he received the National Medal of Science.

Reviews

[David Taylor · Rating 4 out of 5]

Too much time is spent on pre-modern gunpowder rockets, and the book is now well out of date since its 1985 publication date, but it’s still a great introduction to the first several decades of space exploration. It covers the German V-2 program, early postwar American rocket development, and the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo programs in a coherent, but not overly deep way. The final section gets into significant detail about early Shuttle launches, and I guess this is due to that portion being written by other authors after Von Braun’s death. There’s some discussion of the Soviet space program, but obviously much more is known now since the fall of the USSR. My only real gripe is the lack of a systematic discussion of the pros and cons of each rocket and how that affected development, but this is more of a coffee table book, and so the photos and narrative are more important than the facts and figures.

[Joe · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book still features in the bibliography of many space books.

[Brahm]

It genuinely looked interesting and I wanted to get von Braun's take, but the boot sat on a coffee table for 6 weeks, I loved the pictures but didn't muster the energy to read all of this 33-year old book.