Apollo 11 : the inside story / David Whitehouse.

Patron comment on 08/09/2019

A first-class account of the USA-USSR space race, reviewed in the New Scientist as one of the best of many books coming out to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the moon missions. Great reading throughout shifting between the American and Soviet efforts, beginning early in twentieth century with Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, the Russian school teacher who conceived multi-stage rockets and space suits, and Yuri Kondratyuk who profiled that a lunar mission would use an orbiting mother ship and lunar lander. Many great anecdotes and first-hand accounts from interviews with the astronauts, some quite humorous. Gene Kranz’s speech to staff on reboot of the Apollo program following the tragic Apollo 1 fire is something that every senior manager should read. The story ends with Apollo 17’s Gene Cernan, the last man to step off the moon, when he fulfills a promise to his daughter, Tracy, that he would get her a moonbeam, leaving her initials etched on the lunar surface.

This is a book I can see myself reading again.

The bibliography mentions Michael Collins’s 'Carrying the Fire' (c1989) as probably the best account of an astronaut’s life. I recall reading it years back and thinking very highly off it.