The Missile and Space Race (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9780275944513)

Here is a history of the development of military missiles and space travel from World War II to the American visits to the Moon in 1969-1972. It stresses the relationship between the early stages of space exploration and the arms race, and that a dual path led to space flight. One was the development of unmanned long-range war rockets, the other, less often noted, was the rocket-powered research plane. The first path led through the intercontinental ballistic missile to the first artificial satellites and space capsule; the latter, more uniquely American, through the X-series and Skyrocket rocket planes to the X-15, and ultimately to the Space Shuttle. The early part of the book focuses on the Soviet-American race to develop the ICBM in the 1950s, and the first satellites, with particular attention paid to the events and reactions that followed the flight of Sputnik I in 1957 and the subsequent missile gap era.

Author: Alan Levine
ISBN-10: 0275944514
ISBN-13: 9780275944513
Publisher: Praeger
Language: English
Published: 07/30/1994
Pages: 256
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 1.26lbs
Size: 9.56h x 6.39w x 0.96d