Overview

In spring 1961 former Washington businessman James E. Webb took charge of the grandest exploration project ever known: America's bid for the Moon. He persuaded John F. Kennedy to support him and gained control of 5% of the US federal budget. Webb's NASA supervised half a million workers across America as they built new machines, launch pads and control centres. But in 1967 a spacecraft caught fire, killing three astronauts. The press exposed a series of failures, as well as the profiteering of Webb's business partners. To protect NASA's future, Webb faced political and press interrogations, and took the blame for the corruption and deaths. His sacrifice enabled his colleagues to land on the Moon by the end of the decade. America had won the Space Race - but the name of the man who made it possible was wiped from history. 'Journalist Bizony's excellent corrective to NASA's mythologized history takes an unflinching look at how James Webb, a North Carolina farm boy turned Washington insider, ran his end of the space race as NASA's administrator under presidents Kennedy and Johnson. A firebrand of a book' Publisher's Weekly Praise for Piers Bizony's previous books: 'Full of sparkling enthusiasm' New Scientist 'Definitely worth reading.' Daily Telegraph

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9781840467642

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Piers Bizony is a science journalist and space historian who writes for magazines such as Focus and Wired as well as the Independent.

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