While growing up in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Milton Wright, the Wright Brothers' father, liked to purchase toys for his sons that he hoped would stimulate their imagination. One of the most memorable gifts was a toy helicopter that was designed by the French aeronautical experimenter Alphonse Penaud. Milton gave his sons this gift in 1878, and, though it was a simple device with a stick bound to a four-blade rotor set in a spindle, it had the intended effect-it caused them to dream. Twenty-five years separated the gift of this toy and their invention of the airplane, yet the Wright brothers were...

This history of the Manned Space Flight Network reveals that each successive mission is considered more complex than the previous one. As a result, the tracking and communication problems become more complicated, requiring more sophisticated equipment. The Apollo missions differ considerably from past manned missions in that there is a requirement, for the first time, to send astronauts to the moon and return them safely to earth. For this reason, the position of the spacecraft must be known at all times and continuous communications must be maintained between earth and the spacecraft during...

One of the most important developments of the twentieth century has been the movement of humanity into space with machines and people. The underpinnings of that movement-why it took the shape it did; which individuals and organizations were involved; what factors drove a particular choice of scientific objectives and technologies to be used; and the political, economic, managerial, and international contexts in which the events of the Space Age unfolded-are all important ingredients of this epoch transition from an Earthbound to a spacefaring people. This desire to understand the development...