The Infinite Journey: Eyewitness Accounts of NASA and the Age of Space

I am delighted to have had a small hand in the preparation of this excellent book written by a superb researcher and writer. While NASA Chief Historian just before the turn of the twenty-first century, several at NASA decided that we should do something to capture for a broad public audience the compelling nature of space exploration, one of the key attributes that set the twentieth century apart from all that had gone before. Accordingly, we asked William Burrows, the author of many books on air and space history, including the seminal "This New Ocean: The Story of the First Space Age" (Random House, 1998), to prepare the text for this overview. As we anticipated, Burrows wrote a richly exciting narrative, to which were appended various first-person recollections of the space age from astronauts, politicians, engineers, scientists, celebrities of all stripes, and others. These provided an immediacy to the thrill of spaceflight difficult to communicate through historical narrative. Additionally, the stunning imagery in this volume included a large number of never-before-published photographs as well as several of the standards that everyone has seen before. The result is a superb commemorative work that captures the excitement of leaving this planet and moving outward. This is one of the few things for which the twentieth century will be remembered a millennium from now, and this book offers something of a time capsule about the experience for the future. I should point out that this is not a scholarly history; the emphasis in "The Infinite Journey" is on revealing the excitement of discovery and exploration beyond this Earth. Enjoy!

I own a substantial number of books on space. This is one of my more beautiful and insightful editions. The combination of historical text, personal stories, and really well-reproduced imagery does justice to the space program and its participants. I recommend this highly as a book for both those who know the ins and outs of space exploration, but also for the younger set who can learn a lot. It's simple and elegant, but also is also valuable in that it's an accurate and useful reference.

Anyone who has even a mild interest in spaceflight should buy and read "The Infinite Journey". The book was wonderfully put together and the pictures alone make it worth buying. The text comprises of the people who made the missions work and some of the anecdotes are priceless. The foreword by Walter Cronkite is wonderfully written by the journalist who did more to sell the space program in the 1960s than anyone else. The essays at the end of the book are also worth reading. My only complaint is that there was no bibliography so you could find out more information on the different projects mentioned but it is a book that I will treasure for many years.

There have been a lot of books about space flight and man's journey to the stars. What makes this book unique - and indispensable - among these is the perspective it takes. "The Infinite Journey" gives us a view of the conquest of space not only from the point of view of astronauts, but also from so many other people who participated in this grand endeavor. The stories come from the men and women who worked in Mission Control, the engineers who built the spacecraft, the scientists who analyzed the data, and ordinary people who had the privilege of living in the space age and watching NASA's triumphs and tragedies. When combined with breathtaking images, these stories give us a very human and personal account.Reading "The Infinite Journey," I couldn't help but be moved by the stories of the Apollo 1 and Challenger tragedies and inspired by the courage of the first astronauts, and even more so, the people involved in bringing the Astronauts of Apollo 13 home. But what really surprised me was how fascinating the stories of the unmanned missions were. In most books, planetary missions and satellite observatories appear as little more than footnotes. In "The Infinite Journey," the personal accounts of the scientists and engineers who built their lives and careers around these exploratory missions really emphasize the awe and wonder of scientific discovery. Even the one chapter I thought would be mundane, the chapter on communication satellites, was full of delightful surprises. I will never think of TVs, or cows, the same way.This book is a must have for anyone interested in space flight, NASA, exploration, or in catching an inspired glimpse of soul of mankind. It is also a really beautiful book that would find a welcome place in anyone's library. Thank you William Burrows, NASA, and Discovery.