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When I was 14, I wrote in my diary that I wanted to be an astronaut. It was 1968, and all astronauts were men. My role models came from fiction. It wasn’t until after I got my degree in physics and went to work for NASA that I finally got to know other women scientists and engineers, including the first women flight controllers and American women astronauts. After leaving NASA, I became a space journalist, author, editor, and book reviewer, often focusing on women’s contributions to space. I’m currently the volunteer historian for Mission Control and helping to capture more stories of women in space.
Having researched, interviewed, and written dozens of profiles myself, I was blown away by Author Bettyann Holzmann Kevles' ability to go beyond the usual dates and degrees to the stories behind why and how women from different countries were chosen to fly into space as well as what they did there.
I especially enjoyed learning about foreign astronauts like French Astronaut Claudie Andre’-Deshays, who, while on the Russian Mir Space Station, performed an experiment on salamanders that proved they could reproduce normally in space and also hosted a fancy French meal for the crew. This is women’s history that all women should know and share!
The fascinating-and untold-tale of space-faring women, from Valentina Tereshkova to Kalpana Chawla. When we first blasted our way into space a generation ago, we did so with men from each of the superpowers. Women were excluded from one of the most exciting adventures of the century-and not because they weren't up to the challenge. In 1962, three accomplished female pilots took their case before the U.S. Congress, but they were dismissed as unpatriotic. We were in a Cold War-a space race-and NASA had already chosen the Mercury Seven to represent America. In Almost Heaven , acclaimed writer Bettyann Kevles gives…
When I was 14, I wrote in my diary that I wanted to be an astronaut. It was 1968, and all astronauts were men. My role models came from fiction. It wasn’t until after I got my degree in physics and went to work for NASA that I finally got to know other women scientists and engineers, including the first women flight controllers and American women astronauts. After leaving NASA, I became a space journalist, author, editor, and book reviewer, often focusing on women’s contributions to space. I’m currently the volunteer historian for Mission Control and helping to capture more stories of women in space.
I first heard of Donna Shirley when Pathfinder landed on Mars in 1997. How did she become the first woman to manage a planetary mission? First, she was inspired by science fiction and got her pilot’s license at 16. Then she went to college.
But wait… she almost flunked out and spent years in a dead-end job. That’s not what I expected to read! She eventually faced the challenge of getting her degree and went to JPL. Once there, she proved herself as good or better than the men.
I ate up her stories about finicky robots, engineers tinkering in their garages, working part-time after childbirth, dealing with resentment by some of the men, and leading the team that built and operated the amazing Mars Pathfinder.
The leader of the team that created the revolutionary Mars Sojourner rover chronicles her trailblazing career in space exploration and tells the fascinating, behind-the-scenes story of the celebrated Mars Pathfinder mission.
Donna Shirley's 35-year career as an aerospace engineer reached a jubilant pinnacle in July 1997 when Sojourner--the solar-powered, self-guided, microwave-oven-sized rover--was seen exploring the Martian landscape in Pathfinder's spectacular images from the surface of the red planet.
The event marked a milestone in space exploration--no vehicle had ever before roamed the surface of another planet. But for Donna Shirley, the manager of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory's Mars Exploration Program…
When I was 14, I wrote in my diary that I wanted to be an astronaut. It was 1968, and all astronauts were men. My role models came from fiction. It wasn’t until after I got my degree in physics and went to work for NASA that I finally got to know other women scientists and engineers, including the first women flight controllers and American women astronauts. After leaving NASA, I became a space journalist, author, editor, and book reviewer, often focusing on women’s contributions to space. I’m currently the volunteer historian for Mission Control and helping to capture more stories of women in space.
This book surprised me. I was skeptical that Mary Sherman Morgan was the first female rocket scientist—surely I would have heard of her before now! But that’s the problem with pioneering women: most of them remain unknown, their contributions overshadowed by the men they worked for.
Thankfully, her son’s curiosity about his mother’s past uncovered an almost mythical story of a woman fleeing abject poverty and cruelty, giving her baby up for adoption for an inability to take care of it, and yet overcoming discrimination to apply her mathematical genius to formulate the rocket fuel that led directly to the first successful launch of America’s first satellite, Explorer 1.
LIKE THE FEMALE SCIENTISTS PORTRAYED IN HIDDEN FIGURES, MARY SHERMAN MORGAN WAS ANOTHERUNSUNG HEROINE OF THE SPACE AGE-NOWHER STORY IS FINALLY TOLD.
This is the extraordinary true story of America's first female rocket scientist. Told by her son, it describes Mary Sherman Morgan's crucial contribution to launching America's first satellite and the author's labyrinthine journey to uncover his mother's lost legacy--one buried deep under a lifetime of secrets political, technological, and personal. In 1938, a young German rocket enthusiast named Wernher von Braun had dreams of building a rocket that could fly him to the moon. In Ray, North Dakota,…
When I was 14, I wrote in my diary that I wanted to be an astronaut. It was 1968, and all astronauts were men. My role models came from fiction. It wasn’t until after I got my degree in physics and went to work for NASA that I finally got to know other women scientists and engineers, including the first women flight controllers and American women astronauts. After leaving NASA, I became a space journalist, author, editor, and book reviewer, often focusing on women’s contributions to space. I’m currently the volunteer historian for Mission Control and helping to capture more stories of women in space.
It’s hard to imagine the competent, happily married Eileen Collins, the first female Space Shuttle commander, living off food stamps in subsidized housing with her alcoholic father trying to break down the door or later having to call 911 because her mother tried to kill herself. As she says, “It was awful to live through, but it shaped me into who I am today.”
I marveled at how she transformed herself from a mediocre student to a woman willing to work multiple part-time jobs to attend community college and avoid her parents’ fates. Not only did she become a test pilot, astronaut, and the first female space commander, she found her happily ever after. It just doesn’t get better than that!
The long-awaited memoir of a trailblazer and role model who is telling her story for the first time. Eileen Collins was an aviation pioneer her entire career, from her crowning achievements as the first woman to command an American space mission as well as the first to pilot the space shuttle to her early years as one of the Air Force's first female pilots. She was in the first class of women to earn pilot's wings at Vance Air Force Base and was their first female instructor pilot. She was only the second woman admitted to the Air Force's elite…
I have read most of the books written about Apollo, especially those ostensibly written by my fellow participants. I have read these books for pleasure, to find out about parts of the moon effort that I did not see first-hand, and to learn what I could from the authors’ mistakes and successes — with a view to the writing of my own book. The books I have come to value the most are the books that seem to have been created for some other reason than commercial gain, the books unmarred by ghostwriting or heavy-handed editing, the books where the author’s authentic voice speaks from the page.
Cunningham was one of those mean little SOBs, and his attitude was hardly improved when his astronaut career was torpedoed by the bad behavior of his mission commander on Apollo 7, Wally Schirra, which tainted the entire crew for the NASA brass. It turns out that Cunningham could also write, and the result is this pungent memoir — the title is loaded with irony. It is the least constrained of all the astronaut memoirs, unmistakably in Cunningham’s own pugnacious voice.
EDITORIAL REVIEW: *The All-American Boys* is a no-holds-barred candid memoir by a former Marine jet jockey and physicist who became NASA's second civilian astronaut. Walter Cunningham presents the astronauts in all their glory in this dramatically revised and updated edition that was considered an instant classic in its first edition over two decades ago. From its insider's view of the pervasive "astropolitics" that guided the functioning of the astronaut corps to its thoughtful discussion of the Columbia tragedy, *The All-American Boys* resonates with Cunningham's passion for humanity's destiny in space which endures today. This is a story of the triumph…
I am a mom and life-long educator who has often scratched my head and wondered why kids give up so easily when things become a little challenging. I learned about fixed and growth mindset principles and decided to apply them to an education setting. What I realized during this time is that both adults and kids give up too easily and demonstrate fixed mindset thinking way too often! As a result, I wrote a few books for teachers, parents, and kids about ways to develop a growth mindset! I am sharing some of my favorite books that can be a catalyst for discussing resiliency and perseverance with the kids in our life!
“If you can dream it, if you believe it and work hard for it, anything is possible.” This passage is why I absolutely love this book. This is repeated several times throughout this beautiful picture book that is based on the life of astronaut, Dr. Mae Jemison. Mae’s parents were very supportive of her dream of going to space, but Mae’s teacher suggested that perhaps she become a nurse rather than an astronaut. She proved her wrong! Mae also became a doctor, a Peace Corp medical officer, and the first Black female astronaut. Mae is definitely among the stars!
A beautiful picture book for sharing and marking special occasions such as graduation, inspired by the life of the first African American woman to travel in space, Mae Jemison. An Amazon Best Book of the Month!
A great classroom and bedtime read-aloud, Mae Among the Stars is the perfect book for young readers who have big dreams and even bigger hearts.
When Little Mae was a child, she dreamed of dancing in space. She imagined herself surrounded by billions of stars, floating, gliding, and discovering.
I have written 60 books over the past 20 years. My titles include picture books, poetry books, and dozens of nonfiction books covering a wide range of history and social studies topics. My picture books deal with concepts such as counting and colors. I enjoy rhyming and wordplay and conveying ideas in simple terms.
From the time he was young, Edward White loved outer space and dreamed of traveling there. In simple poetic language, this book tells how Edward’s life led him to serve in the U.S. Air Force and ultimately in the NASA program, where he became the first American to walk in space. Nonetheless, the book emphasizes that while he was always reluctant to stop doing anything related to outer space, he was eager to return from his journey to spend time with his greatest treasure of all—his family! Back matter gives more details about White’s life and a timeline of his accomplishments.
Edward White was the first American astronaut to walk in space. But before his spacewalk, he was just a boy who loved the stars. As he grew up, he would look up at the night sky in wonder - he knew that, one day, he would visit the stars themselves. In this touching and poignant picture book biography, we see how Edward's passion for the stars shaped the course of his life, and how…
My husband/co-author and I are sci-fi nerds and started getting excited about space settlements after writing two space-related chapters in our first book, Soonish: Ten Emerging Technologies That’ll Improve and/or Ruin Everything. We spent 4 years doing research for A City on Mars and ended up with around 35 shelves of space-related books in our bookcases. About 3 of those shelves are books related to life in space, many of which are astronaut memoirs. Here are some of our favorites, picked so they span from the Apollo to the International Space Station eras!
This book is hilarious and raunchy and is an incredible story about how social progress is made.
Mike Mullane was at NASA when the first astronaut class that included women was recruited. He was a pretty massive sexist when the women initially joined, and he details how his thoughts on working with women astronauts changed as he found the women astronauts to be eminently capable.
By the end of the book, it’s clear that Mullane could still stand to make a little more progress on the sexism front, but he has come a long way. Social progress is often achingly slow, but this is a fun story about how it sometimes slowly inches forward.
Selected as a Mission Specialist in 1978 in the first group of shuttle astronauts, Mike Mullane completed three missions and logged 356 hours aboard the Discovery and Atlantis shuttles. It was a dream come true. As a boy, Mullane could only read about space travel in science fiction, but the launch of Sputnik changed all that. Space flight became a possible dream and Mike Mullane set out to make it come true. In this absorbing memoir, Mullane gives the first-ever look into the often hilarious, sometime volatile dynamics of space shuttle astronauts - a class that included Vietnam War veterans,…
Since I was a child, I wanted to be a pilot. I started flying when I was in high school, and now I am a captain for one of the world’s largest airlines. My journey has been the greatest adventure I could ever imagine, but so many others are out there. Far too many adventures for one person to experience. Through great books, I have been able to visit so many facets of the profession I love so much. I treasure so many of the amazing books about flying that have been written and greatly anticipate the many more that are just beyond the horizon.
This was the book that made me a pilot. I often tell people that the movie was about the astronauts, whereas the book is about the pilots who were astronauts.
In this book, Wolfe captures the essence of what it is to be a Pilot better than any other book I have ever read. I first read this when I was in my teens. Before every check ride, I revisited selected passages to get in the right frame of mind to go out and crush my flight.
This is the book that inspired, encouraged, and drove me. I have read and re-read it more times than I can remember, and I will undoubtedly continue to read it far into the future.
A wonderful novel and perfect book club choice, The Right Stuff is a wildly vivid and entertaining chronicle of America's early space programme.
WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY US ASTRONAUT SCOTT KELLY
'What is it,' asks Tom Wolfe, 'that makes a man willing to sit on top of an enormous Roman Candle...and wait for someone to light the fuse?' Arrogance? Stupidity? Courage? Or, simply, that quality we call 'the right stuff'?
A monument to the men who battled to beat the Russians into space, The Right Stuff is a voyage into the mythology of the American space programme, and a dizzying…
My love of space exploration is an old one. I remember learning about the Apollo missions when I was very young, both from television and children’s books, and was amazed that people had worked together to achieve such a monumental task. I was also massively disappointed to discover that no one had been back to the Moon since 1972! Since then, I’ve read deeply on the history of space exploration and wished intensely that every new NASA plan would bring us back out to explore our solar system. Part of the reason I wrote Ocean of Storms with my buddy Jeremy K. Brown was to create a reality in which that return to the Moon actually came true.
The autobiography of John Young is almost a history of NASA itself since he began his career there in 1962 and retired from it in 2004. Young was the only astronaut to fly two Gemini missions, two Apollo missions, and two Space Shuttle missions. His book covers all of the various challenges the U.S. space agency faced during that period, and he also touches on the future of spaceflight up until 2012, when the book was published.
He walked on the Moon. He flew six space missions in three different programs--more than any other human. He served with NASA for more than four decades. His peers called him the ""astronaut's astronaut.""
Enthusiasts of space exploration have long waited for John Young to tell the story of his two Gemini flights, his two Apollo missions, the first-ever Space Shuttle flight, and the first Spacelab mission. Forever Young delivers all that and more: Young's personal journey from engineering graduate to fighter pilot, to test pilot, to astronaut, to high NASA official, to clear-headed predictor of the fate of Planet…
