![]() ![]() There are chapters about efforts ranging from the nuclear-powered Project Orion spacecraft concept to the Air Force’s “Blue Gemini” and Manned Orbiting Laboratory projects to studies in the 1960s of human missions to fly past both Mars and Venus. Pyle specializes in these could-have-been stories in the book. The latter is about Project Horizon, a US Army study from the dawn of the Space Age that studied establishing a military base on the Moon, including plans to defend the base from invading Soviet troops. The former is about studies in Nazi Germany of the Silverbird, a suborbital spaceplane that could fly from Germany and drop bombs on America. But both are firmly rooted in factual studies, recounted in the book’s initial chapters. The book’s subtitle gives it something of a sensational feel: Nazis in space! Soldiers on the Moon! It seems better suited to the pages of a tabloid like the Weekly World News than a space history book. ![]() Each of these accounts is entertaining, and he offers details that should be new to even many hardcore space enthusiasts. The book is a collection of accounts of little-known projects and studies, or behind-the-scenes tales from more famous missions, that while familiar to many readers of this publication, will be enlightening to broader audiences. Many are well known, but others less so, particularly for the general public.Īmazing Stories of the Space Age by Rod Pyle is an effort to try and tell some of those lesser-known stories. Thse decades of history, plus many years more of efforts leading up to Sputnik, provide plenty of opportunities for stories big and small. The Space Age, assuming one defines it to begin with the launch of Sputnik, turns 60 later this year. Amazing Stories of the Space Age: True Tales of Nazis in Orbit, Soldiers on the Moon, Orphaned Martian Robots, and Other Fascinating Accounts from the Annals of Spaceflight ![]()
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