Customer Reviews

The Rockets and Missiles of White Sands Proving Ground: 1945-1958

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Having worked for years at White Sands Missile Range as a systems engineer on the Copperhead and Patriot missile flight test programs, I was naturally very interested in Gregory P. Kennedy's "The Rockets and Missiles of White Sands Proving Ground, 1945-1958." I was not disappointed. He chronicles, superbly and in exceptional detail, the obscure and relatively primitive rockets and missiles that roared through the clear, blue New Mexico skies in the years following the end of World War II, when America was still learning what the "rocket business" was all about.

Mr. Kennedy writes very well, resulting in a lively, compelling, fast-paced narrative. Starting with the obligatory summary of the 1930's work of Dr. Robert H. Goddard, who flew rockets just east of White Sands near Roswell, Mr. Kennedy then briefly covers the human history of southern New Mexico in the time of the Spanish explorers and the early American settlers. The first large rockets flown at White Sands beginning in 1946 were captured German V-2s, and Mr. Kennedy covers their 60+ flights in detail. Then he moves on to obscure but important rocket and missile programs such as Hermes, Aerobee, Loki, Corporal, Nike and many others. I especially appreciated his extensive coverage, spread over two chapters, of the Glenn L. Martin Company's Viking high-altitude sounding rocket, which I have always felt was one of the most fascinating rockets of the pre-Sputnik period. Milton W. Rosen's long-out-of-print "The Viking Rocket Story" (1955) is the definitive treatment, but Mr. Kennedy presents a worthy technical and historical complement.

The good news is that "The Rockets and Missiles of White Sands Proving Ground, 1945-1958" is well-illustrated throughout with black-and-white photographs and line drawings. The bad news is that some of the (possibly Internet-sourced) photos are noticeably pixelated--perhaps unavoidable in this era of on-line-only archives. My other very minor gripe is that the text could have benefited from a final proofreading to eliminate multiple definitions of the same acronym, for example, and to correct a few typographical errors. This does not detract from the value, quality and importance of Mr. Kennedy's book. I highly recommend this volume to anyone interested in the history of the earliest days of the pre-Space Age.

When I saw this title I was definitely intrigued an entire book about the early years of the White Sands Proving Ground. Space history and the "Space Age" has been a life long interest would this book be worthwhile? A resounding yes this book does not fall short on any accounts.

It is a larger hardbound text printed on glossy paper that does justice to the numerous black and white photographs. George P. Kennedy has written a detailed yet lively description that is topic based rather than a strict chronological order. I found this approach logical, refreshing, and quite useful to my model rocketry interests especially NAR scale modeling. This book would be a good companion reference book to Peter Always "Rockets of the World" for anyone interested in constructing scale model rockets from the time period covered in this book. The photos provide clear details for any scale data pack.

I found the chapter on Korea excellent as it provided me a concise historical context of world events and why certain programs like the Corporal and Nike missiles were sped up to expedite production and deployment.

For rocketry buffs this book is like combining fuel and an oxidizer with history as an ignition source!

I served at WSPG during 1956-58 in the Corporal and Sergeant Projects. The book was recommended to me by a fellow officer at the time who praised its photo coverage. I was pleased with the detailed coverage of the early days at WSPG, from the V-2 through Viking, since they were not well documented while we served there. Although the later systems were not covered in as much detail, there was balanced coverage and a few rumors about early systems were cleared up. I have done some research about WSPG and have written a memoir about our days there that is in the WSMR History Museum. Gregory Kennedy might be amused by that memoir. I recommend the book to Desert Rats as well as history buffs.
Jim Prior, Sanford, FL