Astronomy History

Noah Adams's adventure in search of Wilbur and Orville Wright is a journey that takes him across the country as he follows in the footsteps of the famous brothers in an attempt to know them more deeply, not just as inventors and pilots but as individuals as well.

In the 1960s humans took their first steps away from Earth - and for a time our possibilities in space seemed endless. But in a time of austerity, and in the wake of high-profile disasters like Challenger, that dream has ended. In early 2011 Margaret Lazarus Dean traveled to Cape Canaveral for NASA's last three space shuttle launches in order to bear witness to the end of an era.

On August 21, 2017, more than 10 million Americans will experience an awe-inspiring phenomenon: the first total eclipse of the sun in America in almost 40 years. In Sun Moon Earth, astronomer Tyler Nordgren illustrates how this most seemingly unnatural of natural phenomena was transformed from a fearsome omen to a tourist attraction. From the astrologers of ancient China and Babylon to the high priests of the Maya, Sun Moon Earth takes us around the world to show how different cultures interpreted these dramatic events.

The world of science has been transformed. Where once astronomers sat at the controls of giant telescopes in remote locations, praying for clear skies, now they have no need to budge from their desks, as data arrives in their inbox. And what they receive is overwhelming; projects now being built provide more data in a few nights than in the whole of humanities' history of observing the universe.

In Eisenhower's Sputnik Moment, Yanek Mieczkowski examines the early history of America's space program, reassessing Eisenhower's leadership. He details how Eisenhower approved breakthrough satellites, supported a new civilian space agency, signed a landmark science education law, and fostered improved relations with scientists. Offering a fast-paced account of this Cold War episode, Mieczkowski demonstrates that Eisenhower built an impressive record in space and on earth.

For the Maya, astronomy was not a purely scientific pursuit, but intimately linked to religious, mythological, and ideological elements that were of the highest importance. The celestial realm held a sacred nature, as did the many gods and goddesses that dwelt there, so for all Mesoamerican cultures, astronomy was a fundamental part of their everyday lives. Thus, astronomy was present in their calendars, religion, and even agriculture, and in close relation to astronomy, the concept of time was also an essential part of their worldview.

When Galileo looked to the sky with his perspicillum, or spyglass, roughly 400 years ago, he could not have fathomed the amount of change his astonishing findings a seemingly flat moon magically transformed into a dynamic, crater-filled orb and a large, black sky suddenly held millions of galaxies would have on civilizations.

In 1977 a group of scientists, artists and writers gathered in a house in Ithaca, New York to work on the most important mixtape ever conceived. It wasn’t from one person to another - it was from Earth to the cosmos. When NASA sent Voyagers 1 and 2 on a grand tour of the outer planets, they knew the ultimate fate of these plucky probes would be to drift forever in the unimaginable void of interstellar space.

Apollo 15 command module pilot Al Worden was one of the highest-profile personalities among the Apollo astronauts, renowned for his outspokenness and potent views but also recognized as a warm and well-liked person who devoted much of his life after retiring from NASA to sharing his spaceflight experiences.

Human exploration of Mars is the most ambitious and exciting scientific goal of the 21st century, and few people on earth know as much about this fascinating planet as Dr Larry Crumpler. As one of the long-term planning leads for the Mars Exploration Rover Project, he helped control the daily communications between NASA and the rovers roaming the planet to gather scientific data. In this magnificent compendium, Dr. Crumpler recounts the history of the red planet, from the earliest days when ancient astronomers turned their eyes to the heavens to the breakthrough discoveries.

In this unique synthesis of science and culture, former astrophysicist and writer Joanne Baker charts the global history of humanity’s relationship with the cosmos. Starting with the nearby Moon before venturing through the solar system to the stars and beyond, she unveils a rich mosaic of stories and research that illuminate the significance of celestial bodies in our everyday lives.

Astronomy for Beginners gives you a fantastic insight into our solar system, how it works, are we in future danger and whether we could live on any other planets. Astronomy is a huge subject that covers a multitude of astronomy related areas, in this book we touch on all the amazing-ness of our solar system.

Every living being throughout history, across time and geography, has gazed up at the same moon. From the first prehistoric life that crawled onto land guided by the power of the tides, to the division of time into months and seasons for the first humans, the moon has driven the expansion and development of our world. Our Moon tells the dazzling story of how the Moon has shaped life as we know it, fuelled dramatic change across the globe and could be the key to humanity's future.

In the decades after the Apollo program, American space shuttles flew over 130 missions and successfully completed over 98 percent of them, but unfortunately, the two most famous missions were the ones that ended tragically aboard the Challenger and Columbia. The Space Shuttle Challenger Disaster: The History and Legacy of NASA’s Most Notorious Tragedy chronicles the disaster from the origins of the Challenger mission to what went so terribly wrong.

You’ve heard of the space race, but do you know the whole story? The most ambitious race humankind has ever undertaken was masterminded in the shadows by two engineers on opposite sides of the Cold War - Wernher von Braun, a former Nazi officer living in the US, and Sergei Korolev, a Russian rocket designer once jailed for crimes against his country - and your textbooks probably never told you. From Amy Cherrix comes the extraordinary hidden story of the space race and the bitter rivalry that launched humankind to the moon.

Decía Carl Sagan que para hacer una tarta de manzana primero hay que crear el universo. Harry Cliff, prestigioso físico de la Universidad de Cambridge, emprende la búsqueda de la receta perfecta recogiendo los ingredientes a través del cosmos, en los núcleos de estrellas moribundas, y retrocediendo en el tiempo hasta la fracción de segundo inmediatamente posterior a la que todo se creó, para entender, entre otras muchas cosas, de dónde proviene la materia.

A complete visual guide to the universe. Take a look through the lens and discover the beauty and science of the magnificent world that is our night sky - and beyond. From the 150km- (93 mile-) -wide impact craters on the moon to Jupiter's Great Red Spot, a swirling storm that started in the 1600s, learn all about the history of astronomy. Find out about astronomical phenomena and take a tour of the solar system. This easy-to-follow audiobook also explains the science behind the wonders of the sky.

During the formative years of Egyptian civilization, each Cosmogony was present. Students from many regions and segments of society attended the Houses of Life, and royals regularly donated endowments for the temple's maintenance and activities. These circumstances suggest a theological harmony, suggesting that a group of religious centers must have been cohesive despite their distinctive teachings and practices. Regardless of time or place in popularity, each creation myth was integral to the Egyptians' worldview.

"Hace muchos años -1976- estuve en Tucson, Arizona, y en el planetario de la ciudad había un ciclo de charlas de divulgación. Una de ellas me llamó poderosamente la atención. La ofrecía el astrónomo de la Universidad de Arizona, Nick Woolf, y se titulaba "The Universe: I can Feel it in my Bones". El título era tan provocativo que me inspiró para una charla pública que, ya de vuelta en Chile, he dictado durante años: "Somos polvo de estrellas". A miles de jóvenes y no tan jóvenes les he contado lo que yo considero una de las más grandes historias de la astronomía.

Kelly Johnson designed the Blackbird, a plane that flew non-stop from London to Los Angeles in less than four hours, outracing the sun and landing four hours before it had taken off, a remarkable feat - and this was more than 35 years ago. Johnson was the innovative genius behind Lockheed's "Skunk Works", and played a leading role in the development of more than forty aircraft, including some of America's most sophisticated planes such as the Constellation, Shooting Star, F-104, U-2, and the SR-71 Blackbird.