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OverviewThe moon landing of 1969 stands as an iconic moment for both the United States and humankind. The familiar story focuses on the journey of the brave astronauts, who brought home Moon rocks and startling photographs. But Apollo's full account includes the earthbound engineers, mounds of their crumpled paper, and smoldering metal shards of exploded engines. How exactly did the nation, step by difficult step, take men to the Moon and back? In The Apollo Chronicles, fifty years after the moon landing, author Brandon R. Brown, himself the son of an Apollo engineer, revisits the men and women who toiled behind the lights. He relays the defining twentieth-century project from its roots, bringing the engineers' work and personalities to bright life on the page. Set against the backdrop of a turbulent American decade, the narrative whisks audiences through tense deadlines and technical miracles, from President John F. Kennedy's 1961 challenge to NASA's 1969 lunar triumph, as engineers confronted wave after wave of previously unthinkable challenges. Brown immerses readers in key physical hurdles--from building the world's most powerful rockets to keeping humans alive in the hostile void of space--using language free of acronyms and technical jargon. The book also pulls back from the detailed tasks and asks larger questions. What did we learn about the Moon? And what can this uniquely innovative project teach us today? Full Product DetailsAuthor: Brandon R. Brown (Professor of Physics, Professor of Physics, University of San Francisco)Publisher: Oxford University Press Inc Imprint: Oxford University Press Inc Dimensions: Width: 16.30cm , Height: 2.80cm , Length: 23.90cm Weight: 0.567kg ISBN: 9780190681340ISBN 10: 0190681349 Pages: 288 Publication Date: 14 November 2019 Audience: General/trade , General Format: Hardback Publisher's Status: Active Availability: To order  Stock availability from the supplier is unknown. We will order it for you and ship this item to you once it is received by us. Table of ContentsPreface Acknowledgments Chapter One: 1945 - Origins Chapter Two: 1957 - Paths, Power and Panic Chapter Three: 1960 - Silent Movies and Old-World Evenings Chapter Four: 1961 - A Toddler's Marathon Chapter Five: The Moon Chapter Six: 1962 - Punch Cards and a Key to the Trunk Chapter Seven: 1964 - Of Doubts and Bugs Chapter Eight: 1965 - Saturn Breathes Chapter Nine: 1966 - Of Software and Star Balls Chapter Ten: 1967 - From Madness to Miracle Chapter Eleven: 1968 - Of Timeless Views and New Perspectives Chapter Twelve: 1969 - Alarms and Lightning Chapter Thirteen: 1972 - From Rovers to Regrets Chapter Fourteen: 1981 - Farther Along Chapter Fifteen: Today - Mementos and Returns Chapter Sixteen: How We Did ItReviewsIn The Apollo Chronicles, we meet the engineers who toiled behind the spotlights from 1958 to 1972. The son of an Apollo engineer, author Brandon R. Brown devotes his writing chops to storytelling and a dramatic tension that will engage even the most technical unsavvy and engineering estranged of readers. * Nelson Noven, Fahrenheit * While [Brown] appreciates the bravery of the astronauts, his book is more concerned with the astronauts' protectors (which is a nice way of looking at it). This book... is written in an entertaining and accessible narrative style. It concludes with a thought-provoking observation on the heritage of the Apollo engineers. * Mark Williamson, Engineering & Technology * An excellent history of the space program through the eyes of its engineers and scientists. * James Gleick, The New York Review of Books * Brown shows the engineers meeting tough deadlines and performing technical miracles, drawing schematics around the clock, making mistakes, coping with warning lights that blinked at the worst possible time, and regrouping after the tragic death of three astronauts in a fire that broke out in the capsule during a simulated countdown early in 1967. American Scientist Author InformationBrandon R. Brown is a Professor of Physics at the University of San Francisco. His research includes work on superconductivity and sensory biophysics. He enjoys writing about science for general audiences, including articles and essays in New Scientist, SEED, and the Huffington Post, as well as a biography, Planck, that won the 2016 Housatonic Award for Nonfiction. Tab Content 6Author Website:Countries AvailableAll regions |
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