Moon Launch! (The NASA History Series) [Paperback]

CHARLES D. BENSON (Author), ROGER D. LAUNIUS (Author), William B. Faherty (Author)

Book Description

Series: The Nasa History Series | Publication Date: February 12, 2001

Moon Launch! recreates the exciting story of the astronauts and engineers, scientists and technicians, politicians and public citizens responsible for the Project Apollo flights to the moon. Through their teamwork at the Kennedy Space Center, Cape Canaveral became the spaceport for the nation and, in the mind of many, the gateway to the universe. A companion to Gateway to the Moon, this illustrated book describes the seven missions to the moon launched between 1969 and 1972.

Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: University Press of Florida; 1st edition (February 12, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0813020948
• ISBN-13: 978-0813020945
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.9 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,071,892 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Outstanding!, August 31, 2001

By 

Kate (Melbourne, Australia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Moon Launch! (The NASA History Series) (Paperback)

First published as part of the NASA History Series under the title "Moonport", the University of Florida Press very wisely decided to split the book into two easier to read volumes. The first volume primarily tells the story of how Florida swamp land was turned into the world's most sophisicated launch centre. The second volume which will suit the more casual reader goes into detail about the Missions themselves with an extensive chapter on the Apollo 1 fire, a subject which NASA is still touchy about. All the Apollo missions are described and looking back in perspective, I am dismayed that it is nearly thirty years since men last walked on the Moon.

For anyone interested in space, this is an essential book to have and read again and again

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Reprint of a Classic Study in the History of Spaceflight, January 13, 2004

By 

Roger D. Launius "Historian" (Washington, D.C., United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Moon Launch! (The NASA History Series) (Paperback)

In 1978 Charles D. Benson and William Barnaby Faherty published "Moonport: A History of Apollo Launch Facilities and Operations" as NASA Special Publication-4204. It was an outstanding history of the design and construction of the lunar launch facilities at Kennedy Space Center. Of "Moonport," a reviewer in the "Journal of American History" said in 1979, "The authors had access to official documents, letters, and memoranda, and they have apparently consulted all the relevant historical, technological, and scientific secondary materials...all the involved historians obviously spent con-siderable time studying and intellectually digesting technical reports and manuals in order to give their lay readers such lucid accounts of highly complex procedures and operations...it is important to public knowledge to have professionally trained his-torians employ historical methods to ex-plain significant events and place them in a meaningful historical context. Here is a broad lesson...that contemporary society can ill afford to ignore."

"Moonport" has been out of print for many years, and comanding a high price on the second-hand book market, but now it has been reprinted in a convenient paperback version. "Moon Launch!" contains the second half of the text of "Moonport," chapters 15-24, and the appendices, of the earlier work. For anyone interested in the race to the Moon, this book is a must read!

5.0 out of 5 stars Definitive accounct, October 30, 2010

By 

Patrick Gleeson (Limerick Ireland) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Moon Launch! (The NASA History Series) (Paperback)

This book - along with it's companion 'Gateway To The Moon' are the definite account of the mammoth undertaking that was the establishment of Kennedy Space Centre in the 1960's. Everything about KSC and it's environs is on an epic scale, and these scholarly but very readable works bring to life the day to day management decisions, tensions, inter-center conflicts and eventual unanimity that was a hallmark of NASA in it's greatest era of expansion.

Highly recommended.