Among the group of physics honors students huddled in 1957 on a Colorado mountain watching Sputnik bisect the heavens, one young scientist was destined, three short years later, to become a key player in America's own top-secret spy satellite program. One of our era's most prolific mathematicians, Karl Gustafson was given just two weeks to write the first US spy satellite's software. The project would fundamentally alter America's Cold War strategy, and this autobiographical account of a remarkable academic life spent in the top flight tells this fascinating inside story for the first...

Among the group of physics honors students huddled in 1957 on a Colorado mountain watching Sputnik bisect the heavens, one young scientist was destined, three short years later, to become a key player in America's own top-secret spy satellite program. One of our era's most prolific mathematicians, Karl Gustafson was given just two weeks to write the first US spy satellite's software. The project would fundamentally alter America's Cold War strategy, and this autobiographical account of a remarkable academic life spent in the top flight tells this fascinating inside story for the first...